Knock, knock.
“Your Grace, it’s Elian.”
Elian’s voice as he knocked on the guest quarters door was a full pitch higher than usual. A brief silence from inside — and then Calix’s voice came through.
“Come in.”
Elian pushed the door open and stepped inside. Calix was seated at the window table, drinking tea. Bathed in the morning light, he looked effortlessly elegant — and still unreasonably, unfairly handsome.
The moment their eyes met, Calix’s gaze flickered slightly. He seemed to have been reminded of the night before.
“…How are you feeling.”
Calix asked, affecting indifference. But Elian had no time to register the awkwardness — he dropped the blueprint onto the table with a thud.
“Your Grace! If you’re feeling well, let’s get started on another project!”
“…What?”
Calix’s brow furrowed. It had been only a few hours since he’d been conjuring atmospheres and saying things like my Lord. And the very first thing out of this man’s mouth upon entering the room was construction talk.
“What is it this time. Wasn’t the wall finished?”
“The wall was external defense. This one is internal welfare.”
Elian’s eyes lit up as he stepped closer to Calix.
“Your Grace — do you know the phrase ‘toasting your back’?”
“Toasting your… back? Is that some kind of torture?”
“No. It’s heaven.”
Elian smiled his most confident smile and spread the blueprint open.
“That magnificent cold of yours — it’s time to donate it to the floor. I’m going to make you the finest heating apparatus in the North… no, no — the finest Mana power source in the North.”
Calix stared at Elian as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. But the sight of Elian chattering away at him with such unrestrained enthusiasm made the version of himself that had lain awake agonizing under the covers the night before feel utterly foolish by comparison.
…Ha.
A quiet, involuntary laugh slipped out. This man really couldn’t be let out of his sight.
“Explain it then. This ‘toasting your back’ torture of yours.”
Calix set down his teacup and turned to face him. The second grand project — the Ondol Project — had begun.
“So what you’re saying is….”
Calix’s brow creased deeper. He looked back and forth between the blueprint spread across the table and Elian, who was gazing at him with those bright, eager eyes.
“You want me to pour my Mana into the floor? Just to heat a room?”
“Just, Your Grace? This is a matter of survival.”
Elian said gravely.
“Your Mana is cold-attribute. But from a magical engineering standpoint, if you compress and circulate cold energy, you can extract enormous heat as a counterforce. It’s called the heat pump principle.”
“Heat… what?”
“You don’t need to understand the technical side. What matters is this — if Your Grace simply places a hand on the Mana stone we’ll install in the basement, warm water will flow through these pipes and circulate under the entire floor.”
Elian launched into an impassioned sermon on the greatness of Ondol. A fireplace only heats the air, and cools down fast — but Ondol heats the stone itself and retains that warmth. The feeling of your back slowly sizzling under a thick blanket was something the people of the North had simply never known.
“Aren’t you cold at night too, Your Grace? There’s only so much I can do holding you. But with this Ondol installed, it’ll be warm around the clock — just like being in my arms the whole time.”
“….”
Calix’s eyes stirred. Warm around the clock. To a man who had spent his entire life shivering in the cold, those words were sweeter than any devil’s temptation.
“And if it works —”
Elian drove the final nail in.
“I’ll install the latest model in the guest quarters — your bedroom — as well. The golden jjimjilbang edition.”
A brief silence. Calix crossed his arms and considered — then gave a single decisive nod.
“Fine. I’ll allow it.”
“Yes! Then we start construction right away!”
* * *
“My Lord! Are you truly going to tear up the entire floor?!”
Hans protested with a pained expression. But Elian was resolute.
“Tear it up. All of it.”
CRASH, BANG, THUD! The stone floor of the manor bedroom was ripped up in sections. In the middle of a dust-filled construction site, Elian gave instructions with pure delight.
“Right — floor leveling first! Then the insulation — mix straw and charcoal into the earth and pack it down!”
The problem was the pipes. Normally he’d use PEX pipe or copper tubing — none of which existed here. Elian purchased a large quantity of raw copper ore from the System Shop.
“Your Grace, I’m counting on you.”
“…You’re telling me to play blacksmith now as well?”
Calix asked, looking thoroughly done with everything.
“Without Your Grace’s precise Mana control, there’s no way to draw these thin pipes seamlessly. Any joint gap and we’ll be swimming in water.”
“Ha.”
Calix sighed — and extended his hand anyway. Wuuung —. The Grand Duke’s Mana enveloped the raw copper ore. The solid metal stretched like taffy and transformed into smooth, seamless pipes of exactly the width and length Elian needed.
“Wow, as expected from a human fabrication machine — I mean, the Grand Duke himself! Incredible quality!”
Elian gave a thumbs up. Calix muttered “Be quiet” — but every time Elian praised him, the pipes came out a little smoother.
And so the pipe work was finished in half a day. Winding pipes were laid across the entire floor like a network of veins. They were covered in gravel and packed earth, topped with thin stone slabs, and finished with smooth leather in place of a floor mat.
Meanwhile, in the basement, a massive water tank inscribed with a magic circle was installed. All preparations were complete.
* * *
“Ignition — activating!”
Elian’s bedroom.
Calix placed his hand on the Mana control stone connected to the basement.
Wuuung — Shhhhhhh —.
With a faint vibration, the sound of flowing water reached their ears. The Grand Duke’s cold Mana passed through the magic circle and was converted into thermal energy — and the heated water began circulating through pumps beneath the floor.
At first, nothing seemed to change. Calix looked down at the floor with skeptical eyes.
“This is really supposed to make it warm?”
“Give it time. The stone needs a moment to heat up.”
Ten minutes. Twenty minutes. Outside the window, a biting snowstorm was raging — but as time passed, the air inside the room was quietly, subtly changing. The tip of the nose no longer stung with cold. Without a single log on the fireplace, a gentle warmth had begun rising steadily from the soles of their feet upward.
“It’s here!”
Elian kicked off his shoes and threw himself down onto the floor.
“Ohhhhh….”
Elian sprawled flat on his back and let out a deeply satisfied, middle-aged-man groan. That slow, rising heat seeping into his back. The comfort written into the DNA of every Korean. It was the first taste of home he’d felt since transmigrating.
“Your Grace, what are you standing there for? Come sit. Right here by the warm spot — this is the prime seat.”
Elian patted the space beside him. Calix hesitated, as if trying to preserve some semblance of noble dignity — but the warmth rising from the floor drew him in like a spell, and he lowered himself down to sit beside Elian.
“…!”
Calix’s crimson eyes went wide. It was warm. Not simply warm air around him. From every point where his legs and lower body made contact with the floor, a deep, heavy heat drove all the way into his bones. It felt as though the thin layer of ice that had always plagued his veins was melting away in an instant.
“This….”
“How is it? Amazing, right?”
“…Ha.”
A sound of pure wonder escaped Calix’s lips. He forgot all about pride and dignity, and slowly, following Elian’s lead, lay down on his side. It was nothing like cold marble floors or merely soft beds. Hard, but not uncomfortable. Hot, but not burning.
“So this is what ‘toasting your back’ means.”
Calix’s eyelids grew heavy. Every last bit of tension in his body melted away like snow. Like a cat dissolving on a sun-warmed porch floor, the ruler of the North was melting into the floor of the manor.
“Good, isn’t it? What did I tell you. Heaven.”
Elian cackled and opened his System Window. He’d spent a fair amount on the floor construction, but there were some points left. He needed something perfectly suited for this moment.
Ding —!
[Purchase Complete: Jeju Mandarin Oranges, 1 Box (30 BP)]
A bright orange mandarin appeared in Elian’s hand. A rare fruit — utterly impossible to come by in the North. It had appeared out of nowhere — but Calix, completely undone by the Ondol, didn’t even register anything strange about it.
“Your Grace — open up.”
Elian peeled the mandarin and held out half a segment. Calix received it lying down, mouth open. The sweet-tart juice spread through his mouth. His back warm, his mouth refreshed — and beside him… Elian.
“It’s warm.”
Calix murmured quietly.
“Like your body heat.”
“Right? Now that the Ondol is here, I don’t necessarily have to hold you anymore — ah!”
Before Elian could finish the sentence, Calix’s arm swooped in. Still lying down, he curled it around Elian’s waist and pulled him into his arms.
“Your Grace? You just said the floor is warm!”
“That’s a separate matter.”
Calix mumbled, burying his face in Elian’s nape.
“The floor is the floor. And you are you.”
No matter how good the Ondol was, it couldn’t replace this — the soft give of him, the warm, intimate scent of skin. And being held on top of a warm floor doubled the effect entirely.
“This defeats the whole purpose of installing the Ondol….”
Elian grumbled — but he didn’t push him away. Honestly, Calix’s arms weren’t bad. Now that the cold had drained out of the Grand Duke’s body and he’d absorbed the Ondol’s warmth, he felt far more comfortable than usual — like a cool, pleasant body pillow.
“…You said you’d install it in my room too, if it worked.”
Calix said, his voice drowsy with approaching sleep.
“Yes. I’ll start construction there first thing.”
“No. No need.”
“Pardon? Why not? You said you liked it.”
“Because I can just sleep here.”
“…Excuse me?”
Elian tried to lift his head — but Calix pulled him in tighter, and he couldn’t move at all.
“Stop moving. It’s warm.”
The sound of steady, even breathing followed. The Grand Duke — who had suffered from insomnia — had fallen asleep without even realizing it, for the very first time in his life.
Elian laughed in disbelief and stared up at the ceiling.
Outside the window, a snowstorm raged as if it meant to freeze the entire world. But inside the small room of the manor — on the warm Ondol floor — two men were drifting into a deep sleep together, sharing each other’s warmth in the lingering scent of mandarin peel.
A warm, peaceful night in the North.
