“Yeah, you’re working hard on your day off.”
Along with the regular sound of dress shoes, a gentle voice settled lowly. Ryu Taeha stopped in front of the rookies and lightly patted their shoulders.
The rookies stood there with their mouths open like fanatics, not knowing what to do. Their expressions were soaked in emotion as if they’d never wash the shoulders that Ryu Taeha’s hands had touched.
“Not at all!”
“We’re happy to be able to help citizens!”
Ryu Taeha asked the rookies making praiseworthy sounds their names and affiliations. It was when Dawoon was staring blankly, wondering if he was going to give them an award or something.
“By the way.”
Ryu Taeha, who’d been showing off his fine profile, looked at Yeoul and Dawoon, who were hugging tightly despite the hot weather. Dawoon, who’d been looking at him while held in Yeoul’s arms, immediately averted his eyes.
The novel’s protagonist had a magnificent visage today as well. Should he say it was a face that should be seen through visual media rather than text? No matter how trashy the drama, if that face was the protagonist, it seemed like even non-existent persuasiveness would be created.
In a word, handsome. As befitting a protagonist.
“Did you greet Yeoul?”
Ryu Taeha’s light brown eyes, close to golden, brushed past Yeoul’s arm wrapped around Dawoon’s waist. Dawoon had wondered why he’d stopped the rookies to say something, but it was just about greetings.
“Gasp, no, um… we’re sorry!”
“We were in such a rush we forgot! Esper Go Yeoul, sir!”
The startled rookies greeted Yeoul while bending at the waist with enough force to plant their heads in the ground. Though it would be normal to say it was okay, Yeoul just quietly held Dawoon.
Dawoon glanced at such a Yeoul. Seeing his rigidly hardened expression, it seemed his mood was indeed soured from not receiving the greeting.
Go Yeoul showed quite a sensitive reaction to how people outside the guild treated him. If a situation arose where he was ignored or excluded even slightly, he didn’t hide that his mood was ruined.
“You can go now.”
Having sent the rookies off, Ryu Taeha leisurely approached Yeoul and Dawoon. Between the relaxed sounds of dress shoes, the sound of gravel on the ground being trampled and crushed mixed in.
Ryu Taeha looked down at Dawoon, who was blatantly avoiding his eyes while held in Yeoul’s arms. At the same time, a bright smile bloomed on his handsome lips.
“Dawoon got wet.”
His languid gaze swept over Dawoon’s wet body. When Yeoul wrapped him in water, he’d gotten completely soaked. In contrast, Yeoul, the ability user who’d created the water, was fluffy without a drop of moisture. It was always only Dawoon who got wet.
“Both of you go inside. I’m on leave, so I’ll rest more before returning.”
Dawoon tried to leave immediately to avoid Ryu Taeha’s gaze that seemed to be examining prey. However, Yeoul held his waist and wouldn’t let go. In the end, Dawoon opened his mouth soothingly.
“Yeoul, hyung is really tired right now.”
“Why are you eating that stuff?”
“What?”
Yeoul, who was wrapping Dawoon with thick arms, pointed at the convenience store plastic bag fallen on the ground. The cup noodles and lunchbox inside the black plastic bag were slightly visible. He must have discovered those things in the meantime.
“What about it. I’m sick so I need to eat heartily.”
“What’s hearty about cup noodles? You’re already so thin, you need to eat properly.”
Yeoul scolded gruffly. However, for Dawoon, whose night shift duty was routine both then and now, a lunchbox rather than a triangle kimbap was a very proper meal. He’d even deliberately bought a large cup noodle, thinking he should eat well since he was sick.
“You don’t normally eat stuff like that. You always ate nothing but greens.”
So was he telling him to eat grass now? It seemed too much to say to someone who’d even coughed up blood.
Dawoon tapped Yeoul’s arm wrapped around his waist with a tired expression.
“Let go of my arm for now. I’m getting a cramp in my waist.”
“Does it hurt? Should I massage it?”
“Ugh, geez, just…”
Dawoon’s body, which had been wiggling his waist to shake off Yeoul’s arm, was suddenly lifted up. Ryu Taeha had raised him with telekinesis.
“Dawoon’s been really strange lately.”
Ryu Taeha, who walked toward Dawoon step by step, tilted his head at an angle. Doubt appeared in his long eyes that seemed to have popped out of a screen.
“I gave you a precious day off, and you’re alone. Eating convenience store food.”
While ignoring Yeoul, who was irritably demanding his hyung back, Ryu Taeha especially emphasized ‘alone.’ His gaze was fixed only on Dawoon.
At that moment, Dawoon covered his mouth tightly and squeezed his eyes shut as nausea surged again. Because that bastard Ryu Taeha had suddenly lifted his body without warning, dizzying vertigo struck.
“Why step in when you’re not even feeling well.”
Ryu Taeha’s hand approached above Dawoon’s forehead as he held back his moans.
“Our Dawoon’s specialty is taking care of his body.”
People should do what they’re good at. He whispered lowly and tapped Dawoon’s forehead. Even at that small contact, Dawoon, who flinched and trembled, swayed and dry heaved.
Ryu Taeha casually supported Dawoon and waited until he’d finished emptying his stomach. Exhausted, Dawoon eventually lost consciousness in his arms.
Today must really be a day of bad luck.
***
Dawoon only regained consciousness around sunrise. After raising and lowering his heavy eyelids, he let out a sigh while looking at the familiar ceiling.
“The ground’s gonna cave in.”
At that sighing sound, Ryu Taeha, who’d been reading documents, smiled languidly and spoke.
He’d moved the unconscious Dawoon to Sau Guild’s dormitory. He’d laid Dawoon on the living room sofa rather than in a bedroom, and sat in an armchair reading documents himself.
“Want water?”
Dawoon shook his head. Though he was thirsty, he didn’t want to drink anything Ryu Taeha gave him. Who knows what that devious personality might have put in it.
“Yeoul made porridge to feed you.”
Ryu Taeha pointed at the kitchen with the hand holding documents. He’d thought the burnt smell was vibrating through the living room—it seemed Yeoul had caused an accident again.
“But he couldn’t finish it, so just pass along that he worked hard on it.”
“That’s fortunate.”
Dawoon, who straightened his posture to sit up, answered while rubbing his forehead. It was fortunate in the midst of misfortune that he didn’t have to eat the burnt porridge Yeoul made.
“Still dizzy?”
At that moment, Ryu Taeha, who’d suddenly approached close, reached out his hand as if to touch Dawoon’s forehead. Dawoon barely turned his head before his hand could touch.
“I’m fine.”
If it were the original ‘Jeong Dawoon,’ the moment Ryu Taeha’s hand approached, he would have wagged his tail like a puppy and thrust his head forward.
But the current Dawoon was not that person.
The Jeong Dawoon in the novel had a one-sided love for Ryu Taeha. To the point of being jealous of Ryu Jin, the younger brother Ryu Taeha cherished, and eventually putting him in danger.
Even after being kicked out of the guild because of that, he was a character who went to Ryu Taeha and desperately begged for forgiveness and love.
All the while, Ryu Taeha wore a smug smile and only took Jeong Dawoon’s body. Even after his heart connected with Ryu Jin, he continued.
Recalling the original work, Dawoon ground his teeth. How was that something a protagonist would do?
Dawoon couldn’t find this novel’s popularity factor at all. It just had many handsome guys appearing and was severely explicit, so why the hell was it #1? It was a novel where the protagonist was trash who casually played with his lower half.
Dawoon hated Ryu Taeha. He was a guy he absolutely couldn’t understand with his common sense.
Moreover, the novel only focused on describing the acts, and descriptions of Ryu Taeha’s circumstances or inner thoughts were omitted, making him even more impossible to understand.
The only descriptions about Ryu Taeha were that he was ‘handsome, popular, and a man who liked doing lewd things.’ And the passage that he had an ‘affectionate relationship because he’d been separated from his younger brother for a long time’ was all.
Well, in a rated-19 novel where handsome guys just stick together and go at it, that much would be sufficient.
Snap.
Dawoon, who was startled by the sound made by rubbing fingers, glared at Ryu Taeha.
“What are you thinking about so much again, alone. With someone in front of you.”
Dawoon, who’d been dazed for a moment recalling the novel’s contents, shrugged his shoulders as if it was nothing.
“Dawoon.”
“Yes.”
When he answered while deliberately not placing his gaze on him, Ryu Taeha, who was resting his chin in his hand, sent a persistent stare.
“Did I make some mistake?”
Your very existence is the author’s mistake.
Dawoon pressed down his disheveled hair while swallowing words he couldn’t spit out. Only sighs came out because it was such a waste to have lost a precious day off.
“Or perhaps.”
At that moment, Ryu Taeha, who’d put down the documents, came over to the sofa where Dawoon was sitting. Without any chance to avoid, he sat down right next to Dawoon with a thud and wrapped his arm around his drooping shoulders.
“Did I not take care of what’s been piling up?”
Along with a suggestive whisper, he tried to slip his other hand between Dawoon’s thighs. Before that, Dawoon immediately pressed his thighs together to avoid the lewd touch.
“Leader.”
Dawoon sharply shook off the hand wrapped around his shoulder and met his eyes with a cold gaze.
“I’m pretty sure I clearly told you to stop doing this kind of thing.”
This wasn’t the first time Ryu Taeha had set the mood like this. Like a dog in heat, he constantly touched Dawoon’s body.
Coming into a sleeping person’s blankets or climbing on top of their body was frequent, and he even spouted the bullshit of suddenly entering the bathroom and saying let’s wash together.
Naturally, Dawoon rejected everything. When he barged into the bathroom, heat rose to the top of his head and he’d almost stabbed the bastard’s vital spot.
Every time that bastard thrust his smug face forward and tried to touch his body, he felt both murderous impulses and a threat to his life simultaneously. Living his life, he’d never dreamed he’d be pinned down by another guy. Rather than getting fucked by Ryu Taeha, he’d rather be eaten by a monster.
Whenever Dawoon flatly rejected him, Ryu Taeha only stared intently. As if trying to discern his inner thoughts.
“You didn’t forget what I said, right?”
Instead of hitting Ryu Taeha’s Adam’s apple as he just looked without saying anything, Dawoon asked calmly. Fortunately, Ryu Taeha didn’t have the ability to read people’s minds. If he had, he would have known long ago how much Dawoon hated him—thinking about that made him feel slightly regretful.
“I remember hearing it, but I’m not convinced.”
He moved seats entirely to avoid the bastard who was trying to touch his thigh again. Since he thought he’d get anemia again if he stood up abruptly, he moved his butt little by little to the end of the sofa.
It was dangerous to be alone with Ryu Taeha. That bastard was someone to be more careful of than monsters who filled their bellies with people.
“At least tell me the reason.”
“I lost interest in doing it. That’s all.”
Dawoon glared at Ryu Taeha, who was smiling thinly, and brought up words he’d already said numerous times. It was the first thing Dawoon had done after entering the novel world, opening his eyes, and grasping the situation.
Organizing the relationship between Jeong Dawoon and Ryu Taeha.
“Find another sex partner. Because I’m not doing it with Leader anymore.”
