* * *
Since the day he learned that there was a Song Hanyeong altar in Surim’s house, he occasionally handed over items he’d been using, calling them prizes. They were usually things like handkerchiefs and tie pins, but a few times he’d given him business cards.
“Are you going to grant me a wish if I collect ten business cards?”
“Shall I do that?”
Song Hanyeong readily nodded at Surim’s joke.
‘A wish…!’
He hadn’t expected him to actually agree to that. Surim’s eyes sparkled as he grabbed the business card with both hands and lifted it up. It was a gesture as if handling some precious item.
Not knowing that Song Hanyeong was watching this ridiculous sight from behind, Surim turned the business card this way and that.
Like that, the altar was growing in scale day by day.
But it was a really strange thing. Whenever Surim thought about the day Yoo Hajin came, his heart became anxious and he felt thirsty for no reason. He wanted more of Song Hanyeong. More secret things, more of them.
Since he couldn’t throw a tantrum and demand more from Song Hanyeong, Surim had to fill the lacking desire himself. Surim secretly removed threads stuck to Song Hanyeong’s back and stored them in ziplock bags, or picked up and collected things like used and discarded pen refills.
And then he realized why he felt it wasn’t enough even though he was receiving miscellaneous items as prizes from Song Hanyeong. It couldn’t be helped even if it was called a strange taste, but Surim felt more attracted to things he secretly stole than things he officially received.
“Ah, there’s no pervert quite like this.”
Surim sat down heavily, suffering from self-loathing. And while sitting, he naturally opened the drawer in front of him.
“……”
A bat doll was stuck in the narrow gap between the desk’s underside and the drawer. This bat doll, which was often found here and there in the research lab, turned out to belong to Lee Myeongho. He didn’t know why he stuck it in various places around the office like this, but…
Surim, whose eyes met with those black eyes, hesitated.
As much as he was committing a bad deed, right now Surim wasn’t free from others’ gazes. And coincidentally, even the doll’s eyes seemed to belong to those ‘others,’ making him feel guilty enough that it felt difficult to look at the doll’s eyes.
Surim pressed the bat doll with his fingertips, turning it to face inward. And in a state free from all gazes, he put a voice recorder inside the drawer.
“Just for one day, just one day…”
It wasn’t spy activity trying to sell the recorded contents somewhere. It was just the result of his desire to hear Song Hanyeong’s voice even at home compelling him.
Secretly, he wanted to record and possess Song Hanyeong’s voice. The moment he recalled that desire, Surim could think of nothing but that thought to a surprising degree. As if possessed by desire.
He bought the recorder as if entranced, and the result was this very moment.
This recorder would record Song Hanyeong’s entire day in detail. The rustling sounds of clothes when he moved, the sounds of his footsteps walking, even the sounds of typing on the keyboard seemed like they would be special.
Surim stood up with a sinister smile. Fortunately, one of the seats facing Song Hanyeong was an empty desk. It was as if it had been set up for committing bad deeds.
“Jin Surim-ssi, what are you doing there?”
“What? Oh, no! Just… I was wondering when Manager-nim would come. Manager-nim, how about some coffee together?”
Song Hanyeong, who chuckled, nodded.
“Alright. Let’s go.”
Surim happily followed Song Hanyeong down to the company cafe. This morning tea time spent with Song Hanyeong before work once in a while was one of Surim’s joys.
After avoiding the situation like that, Surim spent a busy day. It happened to be Tuesday, so he went to the General Affairs Team work report, and besides the report, there was so much announcement content that by the time it ended, the entire morning had passed. In the afternoon, he wrote several documents Lee Myeongho requested, and afterwards checked and ordered insufficient supplies.
While spending the day like that, Surim deliberately took care not to go to Song Hanyeong. It was because he didn’t want his own voice mixed into the recorder.
“I wonder if it went well?”
And on Surim’s way home from work, that recorder was now back in Surim’s bag. The recorder, which had been entrusted with the important mission of recording Song Hanyeong’s sounds from beside Song Hanyeong for a whole day, had returned after completing its mission.
Surim planned to check its contents on the commute bus. When he plugged the earphone cord into the recorder and played the sound, the white noise of the office began to be heard.
“Hehe…”
Surim, who closed his eyes with a goofy smile and began listening to the sounds, listened to Song Hanyeong’s footsteps, mouse clicking sounds, and keyboard sounds with a happy face.
It was about an hour later like that. Surim’s complexion began to turn pale.
– Master, it’s impossible to raise the match rate any further. It’s practically already 100%.
– So.
– So, I’m saying there’s no way it won’t suit your taste. From here on, the problem is the part that isn’t the blood.
– …….
– Master, please.
A sigh followed.
– How about just putting your mark on Jin Surim-ssi and keeping him at home instead?
– What are you saying?
– I mean it. The research we’re doing now is about cloning the blood in advance because it would be troublesome if Jin Surim-ssi died, but if you’re going to do this, let’s go with the direction of protecting Jin Surim-ssi perfectly so he doesn’t get hurt instead.
– That won’t do.
– What’s the reason?
A brief silence. And then Song Hanyeong opened his mouth again.
– …Jin Surim is bait to draw out the enemies from my uncle.
– But Master, that’s…
– If my uncle finds out that I can only drink Jin Surim’s blood, he’ll make a move. Because Jin Surim is my weakness. I went to the banquet to advertise that, so I can’t ruin everything now.
It was hard to come to his senses with the newly received information. Surim pressed the recorder’s stop button and gripped the handle pole tightly.
“Excuse me, are you okay?”
The woman sitting in front spoke to Surim. Surim hurriedly pulled out his earphones and looked that way.
“Yes?”
“You’re sweating like crazy. Sit here.”
“No, I’m fine…”
“Sit down.”
The woman who stood up from her seat quickly moved to the other side. Surim hesitated before thanking her faintly and sat down. Only then did he become conscious of the fact that his legs were trembling and his hands were shaking.
Surim clenched his fists with trembling hands and plugged the earphones into his ears again.
He didn’t remember well how he got home after that. When he came to his senses, he was already staggering up the hill.
As soon as Surim opened the front door and entered the house, he sat down in front of it and organized his complicated thoughts.
One. Song Hanyeong wasn’t drinking a vegetarian’s blood, but could only drink his blood.
Two. Going to the banquet together was something Song Hanyeong had planned. To show that he cherished him more than necessary.
Three. So, all of Song Hanyeong’s actions weren’t sincere but just acting for the plan.
Surim took out the recorder again.
– Jin Surim is bait to draw out the enemies from my uncle.
– Jin Surim is bait to draw out the enemies from my uncle.
– Jin Surim is bait to draw out the enemies from my uncle.
Surim, who kept pressing only the rewind and play buttons repeatedly, buried his face in his knees. That he was just bait.
“……”
Everything that happened now felt realistically tangible to a surprising degree. Well, he’d even believed the fact that vampires existed on Earth, so could there be anything harder to believe than that?
Surim, who laughed self-deprecatingly, dry-washed his face.
“Was everything planned…?”
That couldn’t be. Not because he wanted to defend Song Hanyeong, but because the trigger for Song Hanyeong to drink his blood was due to something Surim had brought upon himself. That night, if he hadn’t gone back to the research lab because he forgot his umbrella and encountered Song Hanyeong drinking blood, nothing might still have happened between the two.
Song Hanyeong couldn’t have planned even that.
That was definitely a spontaneous incident.
Thinking of Song Hanyeong’s reaction, who seemed to dislike him at first, the plan originally wouldn’t have been in this direction. If everything had been planned from the beginning, Song Hanyeong should have acted kindly toward him then and seduced him.
The advertisement Song Hanyeong needed to convey to his uncle would be the content that ‘Song Hanyeong can only drink Jin Surim’s blood,’ and wouldn’t ‘he took advantage of the situation since it turned out this way…’ be a more accurate flow?
It wasn’t a conclusion that brought much comfort. How could it be comforting that it wasn’t all planned from the beginning, but since it turned out that way, he was being fully utilized?
Surim wiped away the tears that spilled out with his sleeve.
“Is that why he didn’t give me a mark…?”
Yoo Hajin had said so. That vampires put marks on the owners of blood they’re attached to. Since having it would give power that transcends humanity, it meant that he, being human itself, didn’t have a mark.
Because he was bait to be used once and discarded.
Surim, who couldn’t even wipe the streaming tears and covered his eye sockets with his palms, trembled and took a deep breath.
Thinking about it, he might have planned to do blood-sucking and sex at the banquet, just hadn’t advertised it until now. Since they just returned home because that incident happened, nothing ended up happening anyway.
