# Chapter 33
The heated, rapid breaths exchanged between their intense kisses had slowly begun to shift elsewhere. Bite marks on his nape and collarbone were already piling up, one after another.
As if determined to leave his mark, Kwon Jeonghoo eagerly pressed kisses all over Yeo Dowoon, who was seated on his muscular thighs. Dowoon’s chin rested on Jeonghoo’s shoulder, his lips buried against his skin as he let out a stifled moan.
“Hngh…”
It hurt. The bitten skin, the ravaged chest—everything ached.
Jeonghoo slid his fingers into Dowoon’s mouth, tracing his teeth before pressing his index and middle fingers against the roof of his mouth, teasing and rubbing. To make matters worse, he gripped the flesh Dowoon had been trying to pull away, forcing his mouth open so wide that saliva dripped down his chin. All Dowoon could do was let out broken, desperate whimpers.
Dowoon clawed at Jeonghoo’s shoulder with his nails, as if to say no more.
The sharp sting of pain spread across his skin, and Jeonghoo looked up at him with a smirk. Dowoon, struggling to take his fingers, furrowed his brows and opened his mouth slightly. Though he couldn’t form a proper sentence, Jeonghoo understood his intent. He ran his hand down Dowoon’s stiff back and said,
“I told you I’d take care of you until you’re satisfied.”
His voice was dark, almost threatening.
“Did you mean for me to hold onto someone who’s passed out from exhaustion and do it all by myself?”
Anyone unfamiliar with Jeonghoo’s nature might have mistaken this for a declaration of conquest, but Dowoon, who had been crushed under his intensity for years, knew better. He had seen enough of his schemes over the past decade to recognize this for what it was. Dowoon just wanted to cover Jeonghoo’s eyes, which seemed to carry the weight of a pain too immense to bear alone—a pain that made his limbs go weak and his chest tighten every time he looked into them.
Dowoon wrapped his arms around Jeonghoo’s neck and said,
“It’s obvious you don’t care about me… Captain.”
A different kind of emotion, unlike anything he had ever experienced, bubbled up inside him like murky water boiling over.
“It’s fucking obvious you don’t give a shit about me…”
Jeonghoo patted Dowoon’s waist and replied,
“Seems like that’s what you want. Wake up from that dream.”
“…”
“I only care about one thing.”
As if to prove his shameless nature, Jeonghoo took control of Dowoon’s mouth and head, manipulating them as he pleased. Dowoon couldn’t resist the urge any longer.
“How the hell did we even shower together all this time? We’ve slept in the same bed with just our underwear on!”
Jeonghoo chuckled at the sudden shift in topic, though he found it absurd.
“An adult should know when to get hard and when not to. That’s just common sense.”
“…Really?”
Lately, Dowoon had been dealing with Yoon Minoh, who got hard at the slightest provocation, so he had assumed that was how normal people functioned. Because of that damn idiot…
Dowoon, who had made a habit of badmouthing Minoh as casually as breathing, declared boldly,
“Anyway, now’s the time to get hard, so let’s just get it over with and give me back my memories. I’ll stay awake until you’re satisfied.”
Three days, a week—he just had to endure it.
Rolling around in bed was easier than crawling through a dungeon, so Dowoon thought this was a fair deal. But Jeonghoo only swallowed a bitter smile. He took Dowoon’s hand, which had been clawing at him, and wrapped it around his own back, gently admonishing him.
“I should have stayed with you longer… taught you more.”
Their chests pressed together slowly.
Jeonghoo embraced Dowoon as if cradling the smallest, most fragile thing in the world, his fingers lightly stroking the back of Dowoon’s head.
“All I knew was how to take responsibility and lead. I should have made sure you could at least take care of yourself before letting you go. Right?”
It was a warm, tender embrace, the kind that made his heartbeat resonate like a wave.
Dowoon bowed his head, as if every locked valve inside him had burst open. He bit back a sob, but the tears came anyway, no matter how hard he tried to hold them back.
But no matter how much he struggled, he couldn’t overcome Jeonghoo.
“When you want to cry, you should ask for comfort, not throw a tantrum.”
This damn Delta captain…
“Ask me to hold you and soothe you.”
Because to Dowoon, Kwon Jeonghoo was more than just someone special.
Dowoon shouted, as if lunging at him,
“I’m not a kid anymore! Why do you still treat me like one?! I’m the one who did that to Cha Haseong’s hand!”
“It was an unlucky accident.”
“…”
“It was an accident, Dowoon.”
An unregistered Esper, who had been mocking the miners illegally raiding dungeons with his string of victories, experienced his first defeat at the hands of Kwon Jeonghoo. But Jeonghoo had only given him advice—he hadn’t even set foot in the actual battle. When Dowoon found out, he started raising hell, demanding a fair fight.
That was why Jeonghoo had no choice but to take him on as his partner.
The higher-ups had ordered him to keep an eye on the unpredictable, troublesome new Esper by sticking him to his side. But Jeonghoo had secretly made up his mind.
What kind of surveillance was this for a seventeen-year-old?
It would be better to personally teach and look after him, even if it meant dealing with his temper, so he could at least take care of himself before being set free.
Tears streamed down Dowoon’s cheeks. He desperately searched for an answer.
“Why did you erase it?”
“…”
“If it was just an unlucky accident, you could have explained it to me. So why? Why did you erase it?”
“Because I didn’t want to see you cry.”
Jeonghoo didn’t wipe away his tears like Cha Haseong would have. He just maintained his composure, as if trying to hide the cracks forming on his own face.
He stated firmly,
“I made that decision on my own, without considering your feelings.”
“I know you’re lying.”
“Dowoon. Stop crying and look at me.”
Jeonghoo lifted Dowoon’s chin.
As his bitten lip parted, a drop of blood welled up. Jeonghoo scolded him, as if it were no laughing matter.
“You’re already whining about a headache coming on. I can see it in your eyes.”
Dowoon replied in a tight voice,
“…Cha Haseong doesn’t even know who ruined his hand like that.”
“…”
“At least give him back his memories as a Guide. You can do that, can’t you?”
“No.”
“You want me to shut up and live with the sight of the hand I ruined, just so you can feel better?!”
It shouldn’t have been a difficult request. But Jeonghoo avoided answering, his evasion only fueling Dowoon’s suspicion.
And then, Dowoon realized.
A hollow laugh escaped him before he could stop it.
“You erased it because I asked you to, didn’t you?”
“…I did it.”
“Captain.”
“Not because of you. I did it.”
Kwon Jeonghoo was always someone who prioritized the success of the mission above all else.
He focused on seeing the forest, not the trees, and on boosting the morale and competitive spirit of Delta as a whole, rather than comforting individual team members.
Yet now, he repeated,
“I acted on my own. It was all my doing, Dowoon.”
He admitted that he had let his personal feelings dictate his actions, manipulating the situation as he saw fit. If he was going to make such a flimsy excuse, he shouldn’t have interfered in the first place.
Dowoon let out a bitter laugh, his head bowed in pain.
“Why are you so pathetic, hyung?”
“…”
“The longer the explanation, the more it’s a lie you can’t take back.”
“…”
“Give it back. My memory.”
Jeonghoo didn’t retreat any further. Instead, he silently ran his fingers through Dowoon’s hair.
His fingertip, slick with cold sweat, traced down his forehead and brushed against the tears clinging to his lashes. Pulling Dowoon tightly against him, Jeonghoo finally relented.
“Ask me if you can’t take it anymore.”
The moment his voice faded, the tension that had been coiling in Dowoon’s body dissolved into a terrifying heat, pressing down on his chest like the weight of a blast furnace.
A cruel memory engulfed him.
A memory so brutal, he could only call it cruel.
The flames surrounding the ground-type dungeon seared his skin mercilessly. Overwhelmed by the pain he had forgotten, Dowoon thrashed wildly.
I want to die. Please, just let me die faster.
The scorching heat was so unbearable that death felt like a mercy.
Amid the flames that threatened to melt his entire body, Dowoon watched as the monster disintegrated, leaving not even a trace behind.
