# Chapter 98
“Tell me properly. Why is headquarters messing with you again?”
Junwoo licked his lips with his tongue and made a low sound in his throat. His heavily subdued voice sank to the floor, unlike his usual tone.
“Because I’m Esper Choi Dohyuk’s Guide. Don’t they usually target the Guide first when they want to eliminate an Esper? I’ve also been openly stirring up headquarters by investigating various things. Since they used an amateur, they must have caught the trail, unless they’re idiots.”
“Am I understanding this correctly? Esper Choi Dohyuk was subjected to human experimentation, and headquarters is trying to eliminate both him and you? You’re telling me this now?”
“I didn’t know they would try to eliminate me too. I only found out during this dungeon incident.”
“What do you mean they used an amateur? If something seemed even slightly off, you should have contacted father instead. Do you know he’s barely been able to sleep since hearing that you suddenly started going to dungeons?”
“I didn’t realize it was this serious.”
Junwoo groaned for quite a while. Eventually, he said to Junseo with a pale face.
“Did you know about this? That there are traces in Dohyuk-ssi’s mind.”
“Traces? You don’t mean in the mental realm?”
“Yes. I couldn’t see properly because he doesn’t like being touched, but looking again today, there’s definitely at least one instance. Probably from before his awakening? And it’s traces of being recklessly invaded.”
The mug he’d been sipping from was empty. Seeming thirsty, Junwoo looked down at the empty cup and took out a canned drink from the small mini-fridge installed by the bookshelf. After showing Junseo the grape drink and seeing him shake his head, Junwoo shrugged and closed the refrigerator door. The sound of opening the can broke the silence quite cheerfully.
Junwoo might have taken about two sips of his drink when Junseo’s usually languid voice lowered.
“I just had quite an interesting thought.”
Despite clearly mentioning “interesting,” not a hint of warmth was in his gaze as he looked at Junwoo.
“Want to check it out?”
As the frozen eyes drew an icy smile, Junwoo thought.
“…Alright, let’s contact father first.”
So this is the face he makes when he’s genuinely angry.
***
Good news and bad news always come hand in hand.
Dohyuk stroked the ear of the cat rubbing its face against his hand with the back of his hand. The smooth fur gleamed with each movement. It was markedly different from how it looked at headquarters, confirming Junwoo’s claim that he had taken special care of it. The cat, now plump enough for anyone to assess as healthy, roamed around the research lab filled with various machines before spotting Dohyuk and bounding over with rapid steps.
Meow!
As the red eyes stared intently at Dohyuk like they recognized a familiar person, he felt a different kind of emotion than when he had rescued Seah. As if something shriveled within him was beginning to sprout, he lightly licked his lower lip and shifted his gaze with a ticklish feeling.
The cat continued to burrow into Dohyuk’s arms, unable to properly understand his whispered “I’m sorry.” Why would it pour such blind affection when he hadn’t done anything for it? He only envied its courage to express affection at every moment without being preemptively afraid.
“You’re much better than me.”
Muttering, Dohyuk fully embraced the “good news” that had settled with a light weight.
On the other hand, the bad news boasted such a large size that it was still ambiguous how to handle it.
With that huge thing blocking his view, he was at his wit’s end trying to figure out how to resolve the awkward atmosphere with Junseo that persisted even until they returned to Seoul from Sokcho.
The awkwardness continued even when they arrived in Seoul and got into Junseo’s car. Dohyuk deliberately fixed his gaze out the window, counting the buildings flashing by while only moving his fingertips. Though his gaze followed the endless gray, all of his nerves were directed at Junseo, who gripped the steering wheel.
If one had to pinpoint why the awkwardness remained unbroken until now, it would be Dohyuk rather than Junseo. It was because Dohyuk had been stiff with fear for several hours already, like a newly adopted wild animal. Despite Junseo consistently showing an affectionate smile and trying to coax and comfort Dohyuk, it was all in vain.
Junseo, who had been trying to lighten the mood, finally seemed a bit… sulky when Dohyuk visibly flinched and pulled his body away each time Junseo’s hand touched him.
Of course, there was a sense of guilt about whether it was appropriate to describe it so lightly. But to Dohyuk, that expression—”with plump lips half-protruding and gaze noticeably fixed elsewhere”—was definitely the now-familiar “Junseo-style sulking expression.”
Clearly, until just moments ago, it had been a “look at my face and cheer up” kind of expression. But as Dohyuk continued to keep his distance, it changed to that in the short time between. Based on past experience, if that state of Junseo was left alone for more than 30 minutes, it would transform into a “Junseo-style extremely sulky expression” with high probability. He had to prevent that.
But Dohyuk, already suffocating from being cautious, absolutely had no confidence.
“…Junseo.”
Finally, after swallowing to slightly moisten his dry throat, Dohyuk spoke to Junseo first. Despite the sudden address, Junseo opened his mouth as if he had been waiting, showing no sign of surprise.
“After sixteen hours, do you finally feel like talking?”
“What! …It hasn’t even been four hours.”
The time it took to get from Sokcho to Seoul and then to their officetel was at most three and a half hours, so Dohyuk hurriedly corrected him.
The car stopped at a signal. Junseo turned his head, and his eyes smiled brightly, making Dohyuk belatedly realize he had been joking.
“So you do know. That you’ve been neglecting me for four hours.”
As soon as the car started moving again, Dohyuk was swayed by Junseo without even having the mind to look out the window.
“…No, it’s not neglect, I just didn’t know what to say. I was thinking.”
“Why did you need such a long time? I’m so easy for you. You shouldn’t need to think.”
Though he desperately wanted to retort that Junseo had never been easy for him, he just swallowed his breath. Junseo, reading the injustice in Dohyuk’s eyes, burst into a small laugh and began parking in the familiar officetel’s parking lot.
While parking, it was actually Junseo who first brought up feeling wronged.
“Does it sound like a lie? I feel unjustly treated. Just one suck on my lips from you, and I can’t think straight.”
It was the moment Dohyuk flinched and frowned at the content that contrasted with the monotone voice. Screech—Junseo applied the brake and parked the car, then click, unbuckled his seatbelt and swiftly shifted his upper body over to the passenger seat. Noticing Dohyuk’s rigid posture, Junseo smiled palely. The cold lighting of the underground parking lot colored only half of Junseo’s face. His eyes, shining like polished fruit, were strangely moist.
Only then did Dohyuk realize Junseo still had a sulky face.
“…Are you still angry?”
“Hmm, how do I look to you?”
At the ambiguous response, belated words of apology that had been suppressed in silence ran around disorderly in Dohyuk’s mind, making him fidget with a tightly set face.
His barely opened mouth spat out slow words.
“I’m sorry. I reacted too sensitively at the research lab. I must have been on edge from the dungeon mission.”
“No, not that.”
“Not that?”
At the puzzled question, Junseo grabbed Dohyuk’s wrist and narrowed his eyes with a smile.
“Did you scratch yourself while washing again?”
Dohyuk’s breath stopped briefly. Junseo’s fingertips scratched across the skin where new flesh had formed. It was a wound that Dohyuk had torn again, unable to suppress his anxious emotions. Junseo’s lips twisted as he met Dohyuk’s surprised eyes.
“This is, well…”
Just as he tried to hurriedly explain, his lips were swallowed. The wet flesh rubbed arbitrarily, creating disorderly sounds. Under the jet-black eyes staring down without even blinking, Dohyuk was so confused about even breathing through his nose that he rubbed the back of his head against the car seat.
The tickling sensation felt on the roof of his mouth wasn’t relieved at all. When he urgently pulled out his tongue to rub the rough roof of his mouth, a moist tongue from another followed. He swallowed wrong again. As he shook his head, opened his mouth, and coughed, Junseo took his lower lip between his. The delicate flesh was sucked with a slurp. The touching lips moved from the corner of his mouth to his lips, and then to the tip of his nose, deliberately making smacking sounds.
Still panting, he sighed at his own stupid behavior. Junseo’s words were all nonsense. Who was this idiot who couldn’t think straight after just one suck on the lips? At the very least, Junseo wouldn’t forget how to breathe.
As he frowned at the strange sense of injustice, his tongue was lightly bitten. At the sweet pain, Dohyuk unwittingly moaned.
“Do you like pain?”
A voice as moist as the lips hit his earlobe and crumpled. Dohyuk, who had already turned his head away from the separated lips, hurriedly moved his hand to unbuckle his seatbelt, but when long fingers grabbed his wrist, he lost the confidence to move further.
“Hmm? Should I spank you instead.”
“No, ugh…!”
His wrist was scratched mercilessly, but perhaps due to the neatly maintained blunt nails, it was more ticklish than painful.
“Why do you keep trying to roughly handle what I cherish when you don’t even like it? It hurts my heart.”
