‘Young Prince…….’
No matter how much I agreed to go along with Baek Jeongwoo’s tune for the next year, accepting the name Young Prince isn’t easy.
If he’s around Baek Jeongwoo’s age, he must be at least twenty-seven. If you have any conscience, change your name to Young Thirty.
“By the way, Lee Yeongwoo will be joining too.”
“What?!”
At the thunderbolt-like words, Lee Yeongwoo jumped.
“I said I’m not getting into this shithole!”
“But Baek Gunho is in this shithole, isn’t he?”
Baek Jeongwoo handed over the glass I had refused with an ambiguous expression.
“It would be very reassuring to have LK with us. How about it, Lee Yeongwoo?”
“…….”
Lee Yeongwoo glared at the glass with amber liquid sloshing in it, then pulled my arm.
“Gunho-ya. Come here for a second.”
As I followed Lee Yeongwoo toward the corner, I heard mocking words from behind saying ‘lovey-dovey.’
Only after we’d gotten far enough that our voices couldn’t be heard did Lee Yeongwoo speak.
“Why have you been like this! Not saying anything!”
“…….”
“You said you’d draw a line with Baek Jeongwoo and go back right away. Are you still having a hard time because of pheromones? Or, don’t tell me…….”
Lee Yeongwoo’s complexion turned pale.
It seemed he’d misunderstood something from the continued silence.
“N, no matter what, not those guys! I’ve met them a lot since childhood because of our families, so I know well. Baek Jeongwoo, Yu Gojun, and the other guys—they’re all desperate to climb up by any means necessary. They’re idiots with greed that doesn’t match their abilities! They’re trash that will only be harmful if you keep them close!”
Thanks to Lee Yeongwoo dragging me to the corner, there was distance from the alpha pheromones.
Taking advantage of this gap when my condition improved very slightly, I opened my mouth with difficulty.
“Inner jacket pocket. Can you take out the white container?”
“……Huh? O-okay.”
At the sudden request, Lee Yeongwoo reflexively reached for my jacket.
The hand that had been hesitating in the air for a moment dug inside the jacket.
“Gasp! You’re covered in cold sweat……!”
His face that had been flushed red now turned deathly pale.
“Your shirt is completely soaked! Are you okay?”
“……Give it.”
I received the bottle from Lee Yeongwoo’s hand.
With trembling hands, I opened the cap and roughly dumped some into my mouth.
I don’t know how many pills I swallowed. Just what I took today alone probably exceeded several times the recommended dosage.
“Yo, you really couldn’t speak? I thought you’d been swayed by Baek Jeongwoo…….”
“I told you. I have circumstances, so I’m pretending to get along.”
Every time I uttered a word, my internal organs twisted, and painfully hot heat spread throughout my body through my bloodstream.
Still, it was time to move now.
“But Yeongwoo, you don’t need to be here. You’ve already been a big enough help.”
“Gunho-ya…….”
“Thank you so much for today.”
Leaving Lee Yeongwoo standing there in a daze, I returned to Baek Jeongwoo and said.
“……Baek Jeongwoo-ssi.”
“I wondered when you’d stop keeping your mouth shut like a clam. When did you two become such a close relationship?”
I said to the sarcastic Baek Jeongwoo.
“Let’s exclude Lee Yeongwoo.”
“Huh?”
“From the Young Prin…… Baek Jeongwoo-ssi’s inner circle.”
“Protective boyfriend. Did Yeongwoo cling to you begging you to scold them in his place?”
“It’s my judgment.”
I looked toward where Lee Yeongwoo was standing.
Lee Yeongwoo was looking at me with an anxious expression.
“If you want to have influence in LK…….”
I continued while taking my gaze off that face.
“It’s better to recruit alphas who hold real power. Rather than omegas or betas who have no power whatsoever.”
I’m not an alpha supremacist. Rather, I lean toward disliking it.
But the atmosphere pervading society was like that, and these guys were the type to ride that atmosphere, so I just matched their words.
……I know it’s rude to Lee Yeongwoo. That’s why I avoided his gaze.
“You think I didn’t try poking at the top? But the response was really bad, so I picked the next best option.”
In other words, Lee Yeongwoo, the youngest and an omega, was easy prey.
“I just want to have one connection to LK.”
“Can you get cooperation when his will is like that?”
“I have plenty of time. I’ll gradually manipulate him.”
Then suddenly Baek Jeongwoo reached out his arm and put it around my shoulders.
The beast stench wafted from close range, making me frown involuntarily.
“Still, our little brother Gunho is going along with me, so it might not be that disappointing?”
Who’s your little brother? I immediately shook off his arm.
Perhaps from the recoil, my dizziness worsened and I almost fell forward for a moment.
‘My vision…… is blurry.’
Dangerous. I could feel my limits gradually approaching.
Even though I’d poured in medicine, I didn’t feel better at all.
“……I’ll stop here and go back.”
“What, already? This is a gathering I prepared specially for you?”
Squeezing out adrenaline to the very last, I said.
“I greeted you. We exchanged names. Do you need more?”
Perhaps because my physical condition was like this, did I seem colder than intended?
The atmosphere of the welcome party for the new member cooled as if cold water had been poured on it.
“This bastard.”
At that moment, one person stood up from his seat.
The alpha with the biggest build. That bastard who had grabbed my collar while spouting all kinds of lewd talk before.
“Jeongwoo-ya. I was going to let it slide for your sake, but I can’t anymore.”
“What?”
“He has no fucking manners. And he’s so damn young. I’m against him joining our line.”
At most there’d be a two or three year difference, yet this kind of stubbornness. I couldn’t even laugh.
“And Baekil Pharmaceuticals? Then it’s even more impossible. That Baek Yeonhui is famous for being a crazy eccentric bitch.”
“…….”
Then suddenly, I heard my adoptive mother’s name.
My body stiffened at the voice that followed.
“She seems to do image management with donations and such. Rare diseases? Clinging to shit that doesn’t make money, fuck. Is she a charity or what?”
Rare disease drug development.
Even while Baekil Group was being criticized for immature management, the fact that image recovery was still possible was largely thanks to the non-profit good deeds consistently shown by Baekil Pharmaceuticals.
……Several years ago, there was a time when epidemic pneumonia spread worldwide.
At that time, as soon as Baekil Pharmaceuticals succeeded in manufacturing a vaccine, they handed over that formulation information to the government.
Thanks to that, domestic damage was kept to an extremely minimal level compared to overseas.
“Sanghun-ah. Were you still holding onto losing hundreds of millions on stocks? You’re holding a shareholders’ meeting here.”
“Fuck. I said I’d kill you if you mention that incident.”
Some people evaluated that incident as a ‘stupid act.’ Saying they missed an opportunity to make a fortune.
I know this well because I heard such curses quite often whenever I went in and out of the main office building to meet Chairman Baek Ildo.
“They said he was the second in rank after Baek Ilguk at Baekil. Now they say he’s a has-been relegated to a back room after being kicked out of the main family.”
“…….”
“That’s why he hid his name too. Because he’s embarrassed.”
……Embarrassed?
I laughed. Rather, it’s the opposite.
I’ve always walked a fine line so as not to be a burden to that person.
So I wouldn’t harm her biological child, my younger brother.
In case, like ‘Baek Gunho’ in the novel, I’d cause a bunch of trouble and a perfectly fine family would break apart.
‘You’re my son no matter what anyone says.’
‘…….’
‘If you need anything, tell me anything. Mom will help you to the end.’
……Instead of that villain, I’ve always lived carrying debt in my heart.
“It’s fucking annoying how they desperately try to package business failure as conviction. Fuck.”
People were always ready. Ready to judge the adoptive mother who dared to bring an outsider child into the sacred territory.
That’s why every time Chairman Baek Ildo called me, I tensed up completely.
Because I was afraid that from one disheveled piece of clothing, from one wrong answer, it would show that I lacked upbringing and my family would be humiliated along with me.
“I don’t eat at the same table as idiots who don’t even have basic management skills.”
“……Is that so?”
But.
Just this once.
“Still, to someone’s face…… insulting their parents isn’t right.”
I absolutely couldn’t stand it.
“You little shit.”
I’m 24 years old. It’s been about 18 years since I possessed this body.
“Do you want to die?”
In the end, I showed my lack of upbringing.
* * *
“It’s better to recruit alphas who hold real power. Rather than omegas or betas who have no power whatsoever.”
Lee Yeongwoo clenched his fist tightly.
Baek Gunho’s words felt like they were stabbing his chest.
‘If you really don’t like it, blame your fate of being born an omega.’
He knew. That it wasn’t Baek Gunho’s true intention.
Nevertheless, for some reason, his grandmother’s voice echoed in his ears and he bit his lip.
“This bastard.”
At that moment, Kang Sanghun approached Baek Gunho.
“He has no fucking manners. And he’s so damn young. I’m against him joining our line.”
Kang Sanghun picked a fight with Baek Gunho.
‘Wh, what should I do?’
Kang Sanghun basically harbored hostility when he saw pretty, handsome alphas.
He didn’t admit it himself, but he had the bad habit of taking out his appearance complex on beautiful people.
Everyone knew this, so they condoned Kang Sanghun’s rampage. No, they were actually enjoying it.
“And Baekil Pharmaceuticals? Then it’s even more impossible. That Baek Yeonhui is famous for being a crazy eccentric bitch.”
But the level of his remarks was going too far. Before, he engaged in sexual harassment, and now that Baek Gunho showed no reaction, he was even touching his family.
Lee Yeongwoo could only stamp his feet anxiously while watching the situation with worry.
Then he realized.
‘……Huh?!’
He felt pheromones from Baek Gunho.
He was already unstable from being intoxicated by pheromones containing sexual desire, but they began to waver much more unstably than that.
They said his pheromone control was clumsy—under his expressionless face, his emotions were surging.
It seemed only he, a dominant omega, had noticed this.
‘Gunho…….’
In elementary school, when he felt Baek Gunho’s pheromones even from far away, it felt like his own privilege and he’d get cocky.
But now he only felt anxious.
‘The amount…… is gradually increasing.’
Cool, pleasant spring rain scent. Perhaps the scent of wet grass.
In elementary school, when he discovered Baek Gunho on the rooftop, when he entered the hotel room. That pheromone scent that he wanted to keep smelling rolled toward his feet like waves.
He felt like he’d get intoxicated by that scent too, so he held onto his consciousness firmly.
“Still, to someone’s face, insulting their parents isn’t right.”
That scent suddenly changed drastically.
“You little shit.”
Pheromones explosively surged upward.
It was incomparable to elementary school days when pheromones were barely there.
A tingling energy mixed into the soft scent of green vegetation.
This feeling of being pricked like needles.
Baek Gunho’s emotions spreading through each needle.
Lee Yeongwoo knew what this was.
The aggressive pheromones he periodically felt from alpha hyungs and noonas in childhood.
This was…….
“Ugh.”
At that moment, something dripped onto the floor at Baek Gunho’s feet.
“…….”
It was red liquid.
Blood was flowing from Baek Gunho’s nose.
Immediately after, his body swayed.
His body, losing its center, began to tilt forward.
“Gunho-ya!”
Without time to think, his body reacted first.
Baek Jeongwoo also reached out toward the collapsing Baek Gunho with wide eyes.
Just before hitting the floor—
The person who caught Baek Gunho’s body was.
Neither Lee Yeongwoo,
Nor Baek Jeongwoo.
