The thugs only realized the situation wasn’t what they’d feared when they saw the look of utter disbelief on Yong Cheonha’s face, and they breathed a sigh of relief.
“What the hell, seriously?”
But that relief was short-lived. When they saw the deep furrow forming between Yong Cheonha’s brows, the cold sweat returned.
“I think I’m a little — no, a lot — in disbelief right now.”
His voice had dropped another register, and everyone pressed their foreheads to the floor and launched into frantic explanations.
Yong Cheonha wasn’t the type to go around getting hit by people — and on top of that, the other person had been strikingly good-looking. Add to that the fact that it was an omega in the middle of a heat cycle, and they’d assumed it had to be a crime of passion.
At a club. In the dead of night. With an omega whose pheromone control was completely nonexistent.
And Yong Cheonha — who, more than anyone, wanted to be with an alpha, yet was forcibly kept celibate.
All while being in a bathroom together with the kind of morally bankrupt sex maniacs who, depending on the moment, couldn’t care less about public order or decency.
With the other omega’s face absolutely drenched in blood — how could they not have misread the situation?
Just as the thugs’ biases suggested, Yong Cheonha was beyond a healthy constitution — he was built like steel. A nosebleed? He was the type to draw blood from others, not from his own body.
So of course they assumed it had to be jealousy over a pretty omega. Or a crime of passion. That Yong Cheonha, having reached peak hysteria, had finally snapped and lashed out.
From the uncles’ perspective, it had been a perfectly reasonable suspicion.
“Why the fuck do you always have to go and make me the bad guy?”
But when had he ever hit someone? And how on earth would he throw a punch at someone that pretty? If he were going to hit someone, he’d do it with his lips — so why would he use his fist?
Ugh! This is so goddamn unbelievable! Do you know how hard I worked to find my fated one?!
Yong Cheonha felt so wronged he was on the verge of tears. He’d been daydreaming about a vaguely happy future — running rough estimates on a honeymoon home, even — and then reality came crashing down on him all at once.
That beautiful alpha whose name he didn’t even know — from now on, that person would only remember him as some kind of mob boss.
And even if he said “I’m not the mob, my grandfather is” — who in the world would respond with, “Oh, is that right? It sounds like your grandfather may be involved in some illegal activities, but how fortunate that you yourself haven’t been tainted by it — you’re a perfectly upstanding citizen. I’d have absolutely no problem marrying you.”
Unless he could cut ties with his grandfather entirely. But he was close to the man. And the inheritance he stood to receive was, frankly, enormous.
“Haaah……”
Yong Cheonha pulled his frustration and regret all the way up from his gut and let it out in a long sigh.
Right. Think positive. What Yong Cheonha had been looking for in the first place was someone to spend casual time with — not someone to settle down with.
Sure, there weren’t that many alphas in the world with looks like that, but if someone that beautiful couldn’t even manage their pheromones and was out clubbing like that, then — well.
Sour grapes, probably. If he thought of it as having ended things before his feelings could get any deeper, there was nothing to regret.
……No. He regretted it so much it hurt. His mouth tasted absolutely bitter right now. It really did.
“Ugh.”
He was in a rotten mood. He kept thinking about that man — kept turning over the memory of those sweet-and-sour, adorable pheromones that were almost impossible to believe belonged to an alpha.
What was that alpha’s name? He hoped they weren’t from the same family lineage.
What was their blood type? He’d been willing to donate blood on their behalf if it ever came to that.
Questions kept surfacing, but there was no one to answer them.
Maybe it was because he’d witnessed something so extraordinary — but nothing else caught his eye anymore. Alphas he would normally have given a pass to after an internal negotiation with himself now looked about as appealing as the dirt under someone’s toenails.
“Tonight’s a bust.”
He let out one more deep sigh and left the club. He left behind the clubbers trying to hold him back, asking why he was leaving already, and climbed into his car.
He rested his head against the window and watched the night scenery fly past. The city lights shimmered like waves, and for no particular reason, a wistful feeling washed over him.
It couldn’t be helped — the early morning mood and the feeling of a first love were tangled up together.
That person who had reminded him of his first love. An alpha whose name he didn’t even know. After everything that had happened — he’d probably never see them again.
He’d grown up wanting for nothing, and he’d never been ashamed of where he came from — but on nights like this, he resented it just a little.
Not that any amount of resentment would change his family registry at this point, so he tucked those useless thoughts away.
His family situation and the circumstances of his birth weren’t things he had any power to change. It would be nice to meet someone who could either accept this kind of background, or simply not care about it — but that wouldn’t be easy.
He already knew from experience that his background was anything but simple. He probably wouldn’t get to have a normal relationship like other people. He already knew it would be a rough road.
It was just — a shame. That’s all.
“Ha……”
That there was an alpha like that in the world. An alpha with lashes that long and pretty, with clear skin and a face full of warmth and charm.
Half of all rare-type individuals were alphas.
Of those, how many were unmarried, without any major flaws, at least somewhat self-sufficient, free of inferiority complexes, and genuinely attractive?
Maybe around 20%?
Then, out of that 20%, how many would meet Yong Cheonha’s standard of beauty? Perhaps the person he’d seen tonight was the first — and possibly the last.
It was the first time he’d ever met someone he didn’t have to mentally piece together from a feature here and a feature there just to call them pretty.
It was such a waste — he got home, showered, lay down, stared at the ceiling, and those tear-rimmed eyes kept drifting across his mind.
He closed his eyes, he glared at the ceiling, he even tried watching short dopamine-hit videos on his phone — and still, he couldn’t stop thinking about them.
Current time: 4 in the morning. Deep sleep? Not a chance — he was doomed to lie awake through the night. Summer was already here, and the sun rose early, so the world outside brightened quickly.
In the end, he got up and changed his clothes.
If he kept lying there doing nothing, he felt like he might actually lose his mind.
A running crew made up entirely of taken men. He’d been trying to quietly slip out — but things being what they were now, he might as well make full use of it.
He changed into workout clothes and headed to the track where they always met, and sure enough, the crew members were already there warming up, same as always.
There weren’t many of them, but every single one was strikingly good-looking. Though they were all, as it turned out, beautiful fruit that was only beautiful on the outside.
They say if you join a running crew to find a relationship and you still can’t get into one, something’s wrong with you — so why was Yong Cheonha, who had joined a running crew precisely to find a relationship, still single? Was it a personal problem, or a crew problem?
“Oh! You came too? Seems like fewer people showed up today since it’s the weekend.”
“I have a date later, so I wanted to get a quick run in early.”
“Same.”
Everyone had plans? Everyone had people to meet?
“Well, I’ve got a drive later with my wife and kids. Our little princess has been in a frenzy picking out dresses since yesterday.”
He didn’t have the kind of looks that stirred protective instincts — but he had a decadent sort of attractiveness, and being an alpha, Yong Cheonha had once considered making a move on him. But unlike his looks, he had a bit of a goofy streak, and he was already a married man with two children.
What was his name again? Gong something.
The moment Yong Cheonha found out he was married, he’d been removed from the list of targets — so he didn’t know the full name, just the surname.
Mr. Gong, the married man, shot him a look of disbelief and held up a photo of a little girl in a tutu skirt and a rainbow-colored jeogori, going on about how his kid had recently started developing her own fashion sense — and so the married-man talk continued.
“Your daughter’s name was Yisul, right? Kids really do grow up so fast.”
“Seriously. I’m not exaggerating — I come home from work and she’s taller. Every single time. Mm. Even as we speak, my little princess is probably growing up more and more, isn’t she? I need to go play with her before she gets any bigger. Alright, let’s have a good run today, everyone.”
Most running crews you’d expect at least ten people, but this one gathered six at most.
They all had physiques that were more than decent — borderline spectacular — so even for an early morning gathering, there were occasionally people who expressed interest in the crew. But they didn’t make any accommodations for newcomers and kept up a relentless pace, so anyone new would drop out within a day or two.
Was it the crew’s excessive professionalism that was the problem? Or was it Yong Cheonha’s fitness level — able to keep up with veterans despite being a newcomer — that was the problem?
He should’ve quietly dropped out at some point, but he hadn’t managed to, and now he’d been running with them for three months.
“Guys. I know it’s a bit late to be asking this, but — are we an elite small-group crew?”
He’d been curious about whether there was any chance of a decent single alpha being recruited, so he asked — and the crew members responded with baffled “Huh?”s, tilting their heads as if they’d heard something completely off.
“Were we a crew? Then who’s the leader? Is it Heejin?”
“Ah……. I’m a bit on the shy side, so that’s a little……”
The cold-looking beta scratched his cheek, looking awkward. Yong Cheonha had always assumed he was the crew leader since he always ran at the front — but he wasn’t?
What followed was one surprise after another. He’d been so sure this was a running crew, and they’d been running together for three months — but apparently, that wasn’t the case at all.
Not an elite small group — just a bunch of strangers who happened to exist near each other.
It had started with a former track-and-field athlete who had a habit of running whenever he felt frustrated or mentally cluttered, who had stepped out for a quick run after a fight with his partner.
By coincidence, his workout times had overlapped with the married man’s at the track, and since neither of them particularly paid attention to others, they’d just ended up running together.
It repeated — the two using each other as quiet, unassuming pacemakers — and gradually, people who liked their running pace started tagging along one by one, and it had just continued like that until now……
No wonder they never did group dinners.
Other crews apparently ran a bit, then went out for food and drinks, talked about all kinds of things, and found their way into relationships — but in nearly 100 days of running together, not once had they ever gone out for drinks.
The reason Yong Cheonha had joined a running crew and still failed to get into a relationship was simple. It was because he hadn’t actually joined a running crew in the first place.
