The glass bottle shifted slightly in his tightly clenched hand. Despite the dry weather that made the back of his hand turn pale white, moisture quickly formed on the glass surface in an instant. But the more it did, the more Saehyeon forced strength into his eyes, pretending nothing was wrong.
Eventually, the man who had been pestering him with a bright red face muttered a few curses and left the room. The door, violently pushed open, closed with a loud noise, and the bell attached to it trembled along with it.
Saehyeon stood there for a moment, glaring fiercely at the door, and only after several minutes passed did he begin to move again. He returned the bottle to its original place and then plopped back down in the chair, his body radiating unconcealed fatigue.
“……Fuck.”
Saehyeon hung his head low and quietly swallowed the curse as he pulled up his hoodie.
After suddenly being dropped into another world, he had been trying to respond boldly the entire time, but that didn’t mean he was indifferent to all of this.
Fundamentally, his current body was more of a sunfish than Saehyeon had thought. Not belying the wretched state in the mirror, this body’s durability truly converged on the worst possible level.
When he came home after work and lay down, even though he hadn’t done manual labor, it felt like three dump trucks had run over his body in succession. Every morning when he brushed his teeth, it was routine for pink foam to fall into the sink due to his mouth being full of sores.
For someone who came from a healthy body that easily pulled all-nighters for a week during exam prep, and even added alcohol to that during college, it was an utterly unfamiliar experience.
But just as much, or perhaps even more agonizing than that, was the mental burden.
The previous Saehyeon had been the child of a fragmented but quite wealthy family. Though being a Beta was disappointing, he had also been a physically healthy male. In other words, he had zero immunity to being seen as someone who could be sexually harassed.
That must have been why. Why the luxury item that didn’t suit his wallet situation caught his eye.
On his way home from work, Saehyeon was dragging his feet, heavy with fatigue, and walking toward the door when he discovered something and stopped dead in his tracks. Behind the printed text saying “3 cans for 10,000 won,” neatly arranged alcoholic beverages glinted coldly under the lights. Saehyeon, who had been staring at them as if entranced, suddenly startled and stepped back.
“Have I really gone crazy? Where would I get money for that?”
He had to pay rent next week, and it was still cold weather so heating bills would still be due… counting them one by one, this kind of consumption was insane. Previously, he could have drunk even a whole box of beer, but not now. It was too much of a luxury for someone dirt poor.
No matter how much he was caught up in whatever was either lust or madness, didn’t he still have the relatively sound mind of a 20-year-old? So he could easily overcome such temptations, Saehyeon thought resolutely as he whipped his head around and moved his feet.
“See you tomorrow, hyungnim!”
And a moment later. Saehyeon stood dazed in front of the store lights, muttering vacantly while holding three cans of beer in his arms.
“…Why is this here?”
He really must have been possessed by something. Standing there for a moment, lamenting his willpower, he glanced toward the store door. He seemed to be contemplating whether to go back in or not.
But somehow he didn’t want to. When his eyes met the part-timer’s through the window, his resignation came even faster. Eventually, Saehyeon unzipped his bag, shoved the cans inside, and turned around with a sigh.
If he had known about the incidents those three cans of beer would bring, he would have declared sobriety that very day and immediately carried out a refund, but it was a reckless choice he could make because he was completely unaware of what would happen in the future.
***
After passing through the bustling corridor for quite a while, at the end of the right corridor where regular customers didn’t enter. Inside a room prepared for special guests, things opposite to what one might typically imagine were happening.
Light jokes, flirtation, and laughter didn’t exist in the first place. Oppressive silence and sharp tension sank low, crawling beside the man sprawled in a pool of blood.
The man lying on the floor was already in such a smashed state that it was hard to recognize the shape of his face. His head, dented as if his skull had caved in, only made small animal sounds like “ugh” from time to time.
“Our mother really is quite greedy.”
The man lightly kicked the writhing man’s hand with his foot, pushing it away, and muttered quietly.
The man leaning back loosely in the seat of honor seemed to feel ennui about everything. Dim light poured from the ceiling over his slightly tilted face.
He was an extremely beautiful man, unsuited to this situation. The man, Gil Taeseo, twisted the corner of his mouth slightly in a smile.
His neatly half-swept hair shone with a light golden color in places. Eyes that appeared only black in the shadows were a deep ash gray under the light.
The man, whose pure white and delicate features harmonized well with the pale colors, was quite a stunning beauty.
He was certainly beautiful enough to draw admiration, but he also had an impression that wasn’t easy. A man wrapped in a dangerous atmosphere, as if one’s life would be thoroughly twisted if wrongly entangled with him, sat leaning back.
He intermittently flicked his fingers as if thinking about something. The hand that flicked wore black gloves. The end of the gloves, which only half-covered the back of his hand, glistened as it caught the light with his movements. It seemed some liquid was stuck to them, but it definitely didn’t seem to be simple moisture.
Everyone in the room only looked at the man’s fingertips or toes. Not a single person in this room was unaware that inside that beautiful outer skin was a cold-hearted monster.
At times, to them, that violent beauty even felt like bait that snatched gazes to catch prey off guard.
Especially Shin Seokwon, who had been closest to him from when he was young until the past few years, stopped at an appropriate distance and suppressed even his own breathing.
Because he knew better than anyone that even the breathing of ordinary people was nothing but irritating to a sensitive Alpha.
Gil Taeseo, who made the sturdy Alphas hold their breath tightly with atmosphere alone, soon opened his mouth abruptly. It seemed his deliberation had ended.
“Cut him into pieces and decorate mother’s garden with them. Preferably in a highly visible place, very artistically.”
Gil Taeseo’s father had many children, and wanted to select the most outstanding one from among the teeming masses.
After everyone’s heads had grown considerably, engaging in a slaughter no different from driving drug-injected beasts into a small cage was a natural progression.
Gil Taeseo was the most promising winner among them. For someone who had been out of everyone’s attention for a while, he showed remarkable capability.
In the meantime, most of the blood relatives had long since died or become crippled, and what remained was one Dominant Alpha born by the legal wife. And only his mother.
If other siblings wanted to kill him physically, his mother was the type who wanted to kill him mentally.
The reason she wanted to monitor, control, and tame him obediently was obvious. Because will is utterly useless to a tool.
“Clean it up.”
“Yes.”
And Gil Taeseo deeply despised such a mother in his heart.
Gil Taeseo irritably kicked the man at his feet a few more times, clicked his tongue as if displeased, and swallowed his curses. The people standing around like shadows quickly dragged the man out.
He threw off his blood-stained gloves, drained the glass on the table in one gulp, and left the room. Walking slowly over the long trail of blood left by the man who would be hung up like an early Christmas decoration in the garden his mother cherished.
When he let the cold air into his nostrils, the shitty feeling seemed to dissipate a little. Honestly, looking back, it would be fair to say there were no pleasant things for him.
Probably ever since that foolish mistake he made years ago when he was young.
He leaned against the wall, not caring that the still bitter cold temperature was burrowing into his coat.
He could feel people passing by glancing at him, but Gil Taeseo didn’t care. Anyway, other people were no different from walking mannequins.
With a small click, his thin lips hid the lit cigarette. Long eyelashes cast shadows like an awning under his lowered eyes. Even the smoke he exhaled into the air somehow added to his mysterious atmosphere.
The man who had been standing there smoking as if time had stopped raised his head at some point. It was because a very faint but unforgettable scent had brushed past.
“……Lee Saehyeon?”
The man muttered vacantly. The languid atmosphere from just moments ago was washed away in an instant.
The man immediately moved his feet. His slowly falling steps soon gradually quickened until he was almost running.
And soon he stopped in front of a small alley. His panting breath echoed hollowly in his ears. The scent that had pierced through his nose to his brain, pulling at his fading memories, had no trace left.
“……Ha. Of course.”
As if dreams weren’t enough, now all his senses were deceiving him. Perhaps he was slowly going mad.
A terrible sense of loss, and the awareness that no one other than himself had created it, clung stickily to every step, day after day.
The man lowered his gaze at the stinging sensation. The ember that had been at the very end had already burned through the white body and was leaving a light burn on his finger. The stinging sensation lingered especially long. The man rubbed his fingertips and muttered roughly.
“Really fucking driving me crazy. Whether you’re by my side or not…… Fuck.”
Seeing the remains still in his hand, the man clicked his tongue, rubbed it out on the wall, and threw it into a can someone had left there. Inside were already half-filled with butts someone had left behind.
At the spot where the man left without looking back, very faint smoke began to slowly rise over the completely burned ash.
