―Rrrr. Rrrr.
Gu Jongyeol, who had been about to call Kim Juwon, scowled at the phone suddenly ringing.
<Yeo Mujin (22)>
He stared blankly at Yeo Mujin’s name sitting boldly on the screen, then let out a sigh. He pressed the answer button, and a somehow eerie voice came through — “Hyung. Where are you?”
―Hyung. I asked where you are.
He should’ve snapped at Yeo Mujin for speaking as if demanding an answer, but his entire body was trembling so badly that no sound came out. This is maddening. Gu Jongyeol looked around. The inside of the bathroom was still quiet.
―Jongyeol hyung.
“Mujin.”
Gu Jongyeol’s deliberation didn’t last long.
“I think I’m kind of fucked. What do I do?”
* * *
56 hours before the incident.
Bang!
Yeo Mujin was a little angry.
The moment he hung up the phone, he rushed to a high-end bar in Gangnam where the senior staff of KK Corporation’s Construction Division were reportedly holding a dinner gathering, throwing open the entrance with all his strength as he walked in.
“Hey, who do you think you are, barging in like— huh? Isn’t that Young Master Mujin? What brings you here?”
Whether the Construction Division employees had a sharper eye than expected, or whether all those days sticking close to Kang Yeonkyu had paid off, one employee in a black suit who had been standing guard at the door recognized Yeo Mujin.
Yeo Mujin fixed the employee with a cool gaze before speaking.
“Bathroom.”
“Pardon?”
“Where’s the bathroom.”
He’s clearly aware there’s a Construction Division dinner happening at this bar, and he comes in asking for the bathroom right off the bat. Truly no ordinary person. The Construction Division employee thought to himself that the organization’s heir was something else, then pointed to the left of where he was standing.
He watched Yeo Mujin sweep off toward the left corridor, then returned to his post at the door.
Bang bang bang bang!
“God, you crazy bastard! Who the hell is in there? Get out!”
“If my bladder explodes because of you, are you gonna take responsibility?! Are you?!”
“Just come ouuuut!”
Bang bang bang bang!
There was indeed a bathroom in the direction that employee had pointed. Yeo Mujin found KK Corporation’s Construction Division employees hammering with all their might on a bathroom door that someone had locked from the inside.
Every single one of them was built like a mountain and radiated a menacing air — it was genuinely threatening, and had Yeo Mujin not grown up watching people like them, he might have hesitated for a moment.
“You little shit! Who’s actually in there — huh.”
“W-Young Master Mujin. When did you arrive.”
“We greet the Young Master!”
As it were, the employees belonging to KK Corporation still observed the hierarchy of rank surprisingly well — and this moment was no exception. The employees who had been hurling every insult imaginable at the firmly shut bathroom door snapped their heads around the moment Yeo Mujin slowly approached, startled, and bowed their heads.
Yeo Mujin spoke.
“Is this the only bathroom?”
“Pardon?”
“If there isn’t another one, just piss yourselves. Why are you making a scene?”
“Ah, w-we were just——”
“I’ll count to three. You have until one.”
Even though Yeo Mujin never finished counting to three, all six employees who had been crowding the corridor in front of the bathroom bolted in the opposite direction. Only after Yeo Mujin had fully confirmed that those employees disappeared around the corner did he step up to the bathroom door.
[―Hyung.]
[Ha……]
[―Jongyeol hyung, are you listening?]
[……Yeah, hng, yeah…… mm-hm.]
[―Hyung, where did you say you are right now? Where did you say you were?]
[Phew, I…… I’m right now…… ha, where am I……]
The hand Yeo Mujin raised to knock on the door trembled faintly. Please let there be nothing wrong.
“Jongyeol hyung. It’s me, Yeo Mujin.”
Yeo Mujin kept knocking on the door.
“Hyung. Can you hear my voice? Jongyeol hyung.”
Yeo Mujin’s dark eyes were fixed on the bathroom door that offered absolutely no response. Even as 10 seconds passed, then 30, and still no sound came through, his fine features crumpled into something wretched. Yeo Mujin stared at the door handle. Fortunately, it was a simple door handle lock rather than a keypad — one that looked like it could be broken without too much trouble.
Unlike the KK Corporation Construction Division employees who, just minutes earlier, had been pouring out nothing but outwardly threatening words, Yeo Mujin physically broke the bathroom door — and pushed through as it swung open with a clunk.
……!
The moment he stepped inside, a searingly sweet pheromone scent crashed over him. The concentration of that scent he had been faintly catching for a while now was thick. Sweet to the point of dizziness — a heady, overwhelming fragrance. An impulse so strong it wiped his mind blank surged through him in an instant.
Just before the instinct to track down the source of that smell consumed his thoughts entirely, Yeo Mujin raised his arm and slapped himself across the face.
He had put everything into it, so the taste of blood filled his mouth. Ptch. He spat onto the floor and looked — red blood was mixed in with his saliva. Yeo Mujin observed it with cold eyes, then moved.
What should have been a bathroom reeking of foul smells was instead smothered in the thick pheromone scent of an omega. That sweetness, sweet enough to make his whole body itch, was flowing from exactly the second stall out of the four in the bathroom.
Yeo Mujin was in front of that stall in an instant. He took a short breath, then knocked.
“Hyung.”
“……”
“Hyung, it’s me. Yeo Mujin. Now that I’m here, could you open the door for me?”
“……”
“Jongry——”
The moment Yeo Mujin parted his lips to speak gently once more, the door to the second stall opened. Click. Yeo Mujin ground his teeth without realizing it.
Because the very instant that door opened, an indescribable pheromone scent crashed over Yeo Mujin’s body.
Undeniably that of an omega. He had sensed it faintly for a long time but had always dismissed it as his own imagination — and yet, from this omega who had stepped into the heat phase, a scent meant to entice alphas was pouring out.
Untouched by anyone’s hands — a pure, pristine omega pheromone scent. Damn. He had taken his suppressant before coming, and even so it was this devastatingly sweet, this impossible to keep his head clear around — in a situation where he hadn’t taken it……
“Mu…… Mujin?”
Pale as a sheet, Yeo Mujin lifted his gaze at the voice of the man huddled atop the closed toilet lid. There, the man with the chin-length hair who normally radiated an icy air was looking back at him.
“Jongyeol hyung. Are you alright?”
“Alright, my ass…… Mujin.”
Gu Jongyeol let out a long breath, and the exhale once again sent Yeo Mujin’s mind reeling. Yeo Mujin forced himself to swallow calmly as he looked at him.
Gu Jongyeol was currently drenched all over in something — whether cold sweat or some other secretion was impossible to say. His turtleneck clung to his body and refused to budge, and the gloves he had been wearing were stuffed inside the trash bin in the stall.
“Ha, Mujin!”
In the brief moment Yeo Mujin let his guard down, Gu Jongyeol grabbed his arm and yanked him forward.
