“This is absurd.”
No. It wasn’t getting through. Kang Taejun let out a short derisive snort and looked down at Park Shinui coldly from his crooked posture. Under that gaze, it felt like his entire body would freeze solid. Park Shinui consciously averted his eyes and muttered.
“But… what am I supposed to do when I really don’t remember anything?”
In the first place, even in the main story, Park Shinui had never properly appeared. So how could he know how the Park Shinui in the book had lived, or how he’d gotten entangled with Kang Taejun to the point of forming a pair bond? He didn’t have a single piece of information in his hands.
“Stop with the nonsense and explain yourself properly.”
“It’s not nonsense. What I just said about not being Park Shinui—it came out because I really don’t remember anything… sir.”
The air in the room changed instantly just from his mood sinking. As Kang Taejun’s voice grew sharper, Park Shinui’s informal speech unconsciously switched to formal speech.
“……”
Park Shinui was reminded anew of just how strong and dangerous the Kang Taejun before his eyes was.
Having built up one-sided familiarity alone for over a month, he’d used informal speech and even cursed at him, but the Kang Taejun from the novel that Park Shinui knew was a figure close to an omnipotent absolute being that no one could defeat.
The man with innate abilities and overwhelming power didn’t carry the title of fantasy protagonist for nothing. Though he was gentle to the weak and children, he was cruelly cold and merciless to those he judged to be threats to him. Moreover, if he could render him completely immobile with just one finger like moments ago—no one could guarantee what would happen when he was truly angry.
“I don’t know how to explain this. I’m… Kang Taejun, I’m not the Park Shinui you know. But that doesn’t mean I’m completely not Park Shinui either. So, ‘I’ve lost my memories’ seems like… the most accurate way to describe the current situation.”
Park Shinui, who had experienced countless injustices, had never gotten this violently angry at someone like he just had. He’d always quietly endured, choosing to simply bear it. His life had been sufficiently overwhelming just living each day given to him, so he hadn’t even had the leisure to display emotions.
That’s why Park Shinui had believed himself to be quite numb, someone who didn’t get excited easily. The harsh world had made him that way, and he’d thought it had become his personality.
But just moments ago, he really couldn’t help it.
More than the fact that he’d entered a fantasy novel, the fact that Kang Taejun had mounted him was far more shocking. In that moment, the only thought was that he absolutely had to stop the act. There was no time to weigh the consequences, no mental capacity to assess the situation.
So he’d mindlessly shouted ‘I’m not Park Shinui’ as it came out. Because of that, the situation seemed to have become difficult. Kang Taejun’s expression as he looked down at him silently was rapidly growing colder.
“But since I might return to normal again eventually… I can’t definitively say I’ve completely lost my memories either, I suppose…”
“……”
The more he spoke, the more Park Shinui could only think he was screwed. The excuses he offered made no sense to anyone listening.
“Do you realize you’re saying something that makes no sense right now?”
“Yes…”
Kang Taejun crossed his arms in front of his chest and slowly looked Park Shinui up and down. Even during the Pair Bonding Ceremony, he’d thought something was strange but…
“……”
Kang Taejun’s searching gaze fixed on Park Shinui. Certainly, the sight of him kneeling on the bed with his head deeply bowed looked different from the proud actor Park Shinui he knew.
With sweat-soaked hair, a face stained with tears, just blinking his eyes—this was far from the person who would act hysterical over even getting dust on his shoes.
Still though. Spouting nonsense about losing his memories.
He knew the man did drugs, but had his mind actually become damaged too? If not, his reaction from moments ago truly made no sense. If it were the usual Park Shinui, he would have welcomed sex with open arms instead.
Though Kang Taejun didn’t believe Park Shinui’s contradictory words one bit, he couldn’t easily erase his dubious expression.
“I’ll ask one thing. Do you remember the contract conditions you put forward when we agreed to form this pair bond?”
“Contract… conditions?”
“The conditions that must be unconditionally upheld.”
“Conditions… There were such things?”
“……”
“I don’t… remember.”
Park Shinui answered with a frown at the mention of conditions. It wasn’t that he didn’t remember—he had no idea about any of this. He hadn’t even known the two of them were in a pair bond relationship, so how could he possibly know what contract they’d exchanged before that?
“You set the condition that no matter what I say, guiding must absolutely be done through sex.”
“Se-sex?”
“Yes. Specifically, you demanded to be fucked without missing a single day.”
“How could there be such…”
Kang Taejun’s face as he used such crude expressions was more serious than necessary. It didn’t seem like a joke or words meant to provoke.
A contract demanding guiding must unconditionally be done through sex? Is this ‘Park Shinui’ person insane?
“But now you’ve lost your memories and don’t know how to guide?”
Park Shinui nodded rapidly. As the words guiding and sex—words completely unsuited to him—came out one after another, his mind was completely blank. He realized for the first time in this moment that when a person is too flustered, they truly can be rendered speechless.
“How is that difficult? It’s simply resolved by insertion.”
“Pardon?”
“I’m saying that if you insert and ejaculate, guiding happens naturally without much effort.”
“……”
“It’s a method that can be easily resolved whether you’ve lost your memories or don’t know how. It’s also the condition you demanded most strongly.”
“No! That’s not me though?”
Park Shinui urgently raised his voice and cut off Kang Taejun’s words.
“And even if not that method… I know guiding is possible through other methods too. Like doing it through wavelengths or resonance…”
“But didn’t Park Shinui-ssi just say you don’t know how to guide?”
“Yes, I’ve forgotten now… but given time, my memories will return… maybe as soon as tomorrow…”
“……”
“So… therefore… could you postpone that contract condition a bit? At least until my memories return?”
In the book, guiding wasn’t an act performed only through sex. High-grade guides could aid recovery just by being in the same space, and physical contact was mostly sufficient with just holding hands or brief hugs. Though sex was the most certain and fastest method, that was only possible in relationships premised on mutual consent and an emotional foundation.
Park Shinui didn’t know his own grade, nor how the two of them had come to form this pair bond. But one thing was certain—this pair bond didn’t seem to be a relationship that originated from affection.
Above all, he wasn’t the ‘Park Shinui’ from the novel. If Park Shinui had demanded such a contract, it meant he had special feelings for Kang Taejun to some degree. Wasn’t it wrong to rashly do such things without the body’s owner knowing?
“Why should I do that?”
“Pardon?”
“I’m asking why I should accommodate Park Shinui-ssi’s nonsensical whims. We formed a contract simultaneously with our pair bond. I receive guiding, and you receive corresponding compensation in return.”
Kang Taejun’s gaze settled coldly.
“But now you’ve lost your memories so postpone the guiding? Are you playing games with me right now?”
Kang Taejun didn’t believe Park Shinui’s words. He was someone whose moods constantly fluctuated and someone who acted, so his appearance differing from usual was surely another calculation. If not that, it could be an attempt to seize control using guiding as leverage.
Suddenly claiming to have lost his memories—how does that even make sense?
Kang Taejun remembered the victor’s smile Park Shinui had worn when he awakened as a guide and the astonishing matching rate came out. Just the fact that he’d become the sole guide of someone who despised and ignored him—that alone had made him extremely excited. Even on the night he’d immediately set sex as the top priority as a condition for forming the pair bond, he’d apparently held a wild party as if enjoying how everyone’s perception had been overturned.
He must have thought he’d rebuilt his ruined reputation and grasped the leash of the world’s only EX-grade Esper. And such a person now rejects the guiding method he’d so persistently emphasized? Then there must surely be some ulterior motive hidden beneath this.
