Just as he was thinking that a yellow warning light seemed to be slowly turning on in his head, even such thoughts were caught and devoured by the pursuing lips and disappeared.
Finally, Sim Seowoo’s body fell backward.
Thud.
Cheon Yijae kept kissing him pressingly, so he ended up lying on the floor. In fact, since the kiss had started in a position on the verge of collapse from the beginning, he’d expected he would fall eventually, but the speed was faster than anticipated. No matter how he supported himself with his arms, the other person covered him as if crushing him, so he couldn’t help it.
However, the moment Sim Seowoo’s back touched the floor, Cheon Yijae froze stiffly. Looking down at Sim Seowoo lying on the floor in a disheveled state, panting.
“…Ah, fuck.”
Soon he backed away while swallowing a curse. His body seemed like it would stick to the other person’s warmth any moment, but he clenched his teeth and endured it. The strength entering his jaw tensely could be seen.
Crack—Cheon Yijae bit his lips fiercely. He stabbed at the tender flesh as if digging into it with his sharp canines, and blood burst out profusely.
He barely gathered his reason that way and struggled to raise his upper body.
“…That’s enough now. It’s enough, so just leave.”
It was an order to leave, spat out in a voice cracking dryly.
Sim Seowoo looked up at him with breathless, dumbfounded eyes. He had been pressing overwhelmingly until just before, then suddenly came to his senses and was driving him out to leave without any greeting.
As he just stared blankly because it was absurd, Cheon Yijae mercilessly crumpled his face. He narrowed his brow fiercely and ground out savagely, as if asking if he really didn’t know the reason he was trying to drive him away.
“I made you a chance to escape. Before you see something terrible, hurry—”
“Do it a bit more.”
Sim Seowoo cut off Cheon Yijae’s threat abruptly. Though his momentum was intimidatingly fierce to the point of being violent, he didn’t shrink at all, and rather demanded with an aggrieved attitude.
For Sim Seowoo, it was natural. The red mark on Cheon Yijae’s forehead was slowly being erased.
In fact, from the beginning, from the moment their lips touched, he’d responded because he could see his curse gradually fading. He’d followed the kiss while even enduring the pain of being bitten by those sharp canines, yet now to leave when it was just about half erased.
It was fascinating that purification could be done through this kind of act. He’d thought it was only possible with tools or hands, but purification power was transmitted through lips too. Perhaps because this curse was about marital intercourse—in other words, a problem that had to be solved physically—could it be substituted by mucous membrane contact?
Whatever the mechanism, Sim Seowoo felt like he needed to finish the purification he’d started to the end to feel relieved. No, honestly, now it seemed he’d even feel wronged if he couldn’t remove all the curse.
“Right now, what are you, saying…”
Cheon Yijae’s voice trembled. At Sim Seowoo’s action of not running away even in the opening he’d created and demanding to do more while looking straight at him, confused shock could be read plainly on his face, as if extremely flustered.
Now it seemed difficult for him to hide his expression. Because he had to hold back his body trying to rush forward again with that mental strength. His patience, already broken once, swayed precariously.
However, Cheon Yijae bit his lips hard again to hold onto his reason. He bit down deeply enough for blood to drip down.
“Stop, haah, talking nonsense, and quickly…”
“You can do more, Yijae-ya.”
However, Sim Seowoo didn’t back down. In fact, though he was aware he was committing quite a crazy act himself, seeing the blood bursting from his lips dripping even onto his clothes made his hesitation disappear.
Following that, quick reasoning occurred in Sim Seowoo’s head. Since Cheon Yijae seemed to have overlapped him with the person he met in his dreams, he thought he should use that in reverse.
Indeed, what would ‘that person’ do now—pondering this, Sim Seowoo reached out his arms.
The person close enough for that Cheon Yijae to act spoiled with. Someone who would gently call his name and perhaps also indulge his coquettishness…
“I’m okay, so… yes, you can finish.”
He whispered while carefully stroking Cheon Yijae’s torn lips as if cradling them with both hands.
Then he gently embraced him, frozen stiffly. Like responding now to the two arms Cheon Yijae had reached out as if clinging to the other person while wandering in dreams just before, he hugged him.
Still panting, unable to even out his disheveled breathing, and with his voice also dampened wetly, but whispering as gently as possible, he pulled Cheon Yijae down. The gap between them that he’d barely created collapsed futilely easily.
Cheon Yijae was drawn in powerlessly, as if caught by a touch he absolutely couldn’t avoid.
“…”
However, even though they’d gotten close enough for their noses to touch, he didn’t try to kiss. While looking at the other person as if entranced with hazy ash-colored eyes, he still bit his lips tightly and held on. Was it stubbornness, or rebellion?
But it seemed obvious his patience would soon collapse, yet Sim Seowoo suddenly felt loneliness from Cheon Yijae, who seemed driven to his limit. Even in this situation, ultimately not asking for help, rejecting even the hand extended right in front of him—this behavior looked just like a wounded puppy baring its teeth.
‘No, thinking of his build, isn’t the puppy comparison wrong?’
With that quite absurd thought as the last, Sim Seowoo kissed first. If Cheon Yijae wouldn’t move, he’d just do it himself—he committed the act with that mindset.
Like Cheon Yijae had done just before, he overlapped their lips as if crushing them, licked the upper lip with his tongue, and tried to dig into his mouth. But quite stubbornly, his mouth remained tightly shut, so he tried to bite the lower lip hard as he’d been treated, when—
‘Ah, his lip just burst.’
Even right now, the fishy taste of blood was constantly spreading in his mouth, yet he’d almost committed a huge mistake. He flinched in surprise, having almost completely torn his already tattered lips.
After pondering, Sim Seowoo decided to carefully try persuading Cheon Yijae.
“Um, Yijae-ya. It must hurt a lot and I’m sorry, but could you open your lips?”
“…”
“Fortunately, your curse was being erased with the kiss. More than half has disappeared, so to finish removing it, I think we need to do a bit more…”
Wait, come to think of it, he was in the middle of acting like ‘that person,’ so shouldn’t he say it like this? Sim Seowoo sighed belatedly, worried whether Cheon Yijae might have completely awakened from the misconception due to his statement.
However, strangely, Cheon Yijae’s hazy eyes were unchanged. No, rather, as if overwhelmed by an even greater emotion, even the corners of his eyes trembled.
“…How, to this extent, still the same…”
The end of the low murmur was clumsily muffled. His tone seemed to contain a hollow laugh for a moment, making Sim Seowoo puzzled, but there was no time to look more closely.
Their lips touched.
Their lips overlapped as if crushing together, and a hot tongue pushed into his mouth in one breath. As if he’d become even more thirsty during the brief separation, the action of swallowing breath again continued very intensely.
In an instant, the sound spreading between their lips became wet. It was a deeper kiss than before, and Cheon Yijae’s tongue entered as if stabbing inward, as if wanting to dig deeper, into a very deep and hot place.
Sim Seowoo felt the heat pooling in his lower back approaching somewhat anxiously again, so he hurriedly urged:
“Haah, lips, hng, only lips, ngh…”
He tried to turn his head to speak, but swallowed by Cheon Yijae’s lips chasing repeatedly, he absolutely couldn’t complete his words. Though he had deliberately opened the box Cheon Yijae had suppressed with patience himself, he hadn’t known it would explode this much.
He felt somewhat wronged, and also a bit dismayed, but… still, the rope binding his two hands hadn’t come undone yet.
So believing it would be okay, Sim Seowoo looked at the red mark slowly being erased from Cheon Yijae’s forehead, and after calculating the approximate remaining time, closed his eyes.
This being purification work too, he seemed to be getting dizzy. His head hurt the more their lips touched, but thinking carefully, this seemed somewhat different from the sensation of becoming exhausted after using purification power. Then was it after all because his breathing had quickened from kissing?
Or else… was it because the sense of déjà vu that had come from the moment he called his name was still continuing even now?
“Ngh…”
However, there was no time to continue reasoning. Cheon Yijae strongly sucked up his tongue, pulling as if preventing Sim Seowoo from leaking into thoughts. It felt like he was nitpicking and holding him to concentrate on this act when the other person was thinking of something else.
‘As expected, his perception is sharp…’
Sim Seowoo had that last impression and ultimately focused on matching their breathing. Thud, thud, thud—the headache pounding inside his head rang like a heartbeat.
It was a dizzying dawn.
