# Chapter 166
‘Is that bastard really looking at me?’
Lee Hwan glanced around with an uncertain expression before picking up his glass and walking deliberately toward him. By then, Kang Dongha, who had ended his call at some point, was waiting comfortably with his back against the chair.
Clink. As the glass was placed on the table, Kang Dongha spoke up.
“First time seeing your face around here?”
The corners of his mouth curled up as he asked, but he couldn’t hide his tense impression. Lee Hwan took another sip of his drink before sitting down across from him with a slight smile.
“I’ve seen you before, though.”
“Really? When? During a party?”
“When I was with Kang Taesung.”
When Lee Hwan mentioned Taesung’s name without batting an eye, Kang Dongha’s smile faded momentarily. However, still keeping the corners of his mouth upturned, his eyes scanned Lee Hwan as if observing him.
“Outside?”
“Who knows.”
“It couldn’t have been here.”
“Probably not.”
“Why are we suddenly playing twenty questions?”
Kang Dongha’s face, which had stiffened slightly, loosened again with a snicker. He took a couple of sips of his drink with a completely relaxed expression before putting it down.
But after hearing Taesung’s name, his previously friendly attitude seemed to change somewhat. The smile on his lips was now less about enticing someone and more about wanting to mess with them, unlike earlier.
Sure enough, the question that burst from his mouth was half a disaster.
“So that bastard likes men too, huh?”
Kang Dongha flicked his glass once with his index finger and sneered. He didn’t seem to consider for even a moment that Lee Hwan might be professionally connected to Taesung.
The way he talks… Despite the obvious provocation, Lee Hwan felt his hands itching. He wanted to smack him on the head.
“If you run your mouth wrong, you could get beaten badly. Ever been hit with a broken glass?”
But despite the rather vicious threat, Kang Dongha didn’t seem intimidated. He asked with a grinning face:
“Those cufflinks, they’re Kang Taesung’s, right?”
“…No.”
“Wearing a fake suit but sporting ultra-limited edition cufflinks that can barely be seen?”
Sharp-eyed bastard. Lee Hwan’s expression crumpled slightly. He didn’t expect him to immediately recognize a fake in this dimly lit space with only ambiguous lighting.
Moreover, beyond identifying the authenticity of the cufflinks, he even deduced that they were Taesung’s items that Lee Hwan had secretly borrowed. His perceptiveness was truly S-class.
‘How annoying.’
Who the hell called this guy an idiot? Though he was using it in the wrong direction, he was actually quite intelligent.
Kang Dongha, watching Lee Hwan’s reaction, giggled and placed his arms on the table. Then, resting his chin on his elbows, he leaned in and examined Lee Hwan’s appearance as if licking him with his eyes.
“Do you like accessories? I have some of those too. From this season.”
So what? Lee Hwan almost replied like that. He openly changed his expression as Kang Dongha’s face came unpleasantly close. But Kang Dongha was indeed thick-skinned. He genuinely didn’t care about Lee Hwan’s feelings.
“Want one?”
Instead, he reached out and suddenly started fiddling with Lee Hwan’s shirt collar. What the hell is this guy doing? Before Lee Hwan could make any retort, the tip of Kang Dongha’s thumb slipped inside the collar and brushed against his neck.
‘What the fuck…!’
In that moment, goosebumps rose all the way to his scalp. The back of his neck instantly stiffened.
As Lee Hwan knocked away Kang Dongha’s hand with a twisted face—
SMACK!
A sound like being hit with a bat came from the hand.
“Argh! You crazy…!”
Only then did his hand retract completely back to its place, as if he had never behaved improperly. The groaning sound he made seemed genuinely painful.
“I was trying to be nice, but you’re so filthy. Seriously, I have to hit and threaten you to make you listen.”
When Lee Hwan growled in disgust, Kang Dongha, clutching his hand and groaning, spoke with an utterly shameless face.
“You bastard, if it’s broken, there’s no settlement.”
“Sure, go ahead and report to the police that your hand broke after you got hit while groping someone’s neck.”
“Police station? It would be the Hunter Administration Bureau. Since you hit a civilian.”
An irritating smile reappeared on Kang Dongha’s contorted face. Lee Hwan bit his lip hard and stopped abruptly.
How did he know he was an Awakened person too? He’d only hit him with enough force that even a non-Awakened person could generate.
As if sensing Lee Hwan’s thoughts, Kang Dongha massaged his painful hand and mocked him.
“Never hit anyone before awakening? Normally, when you hit someone with your bare hands, your hand should hurt just as much.”
These Awakened bastards don’t know anything, he muttered. Lee Hwan was beginning to understand Kang Dongha’s style.
He was clearly intelligent, but rather than clever, he was more of an obnoxious, sly person.
“Come to think of it, aren’t you that A-grade? The one that crazy bastard is keeping around?”
“Do you like being buried alive?”
“Good timing. I’ve got dirt on that bastard too.”
“Water burial?”
“Did you know I turned on my recorder when you hit me?”
“This fucking…”
It seemed like the longer he dragged this out, the more entangled he would become. Lee Hwan grimaced, then pressed his forehead and stared at Kang Dongha.
His face, which had become slightly more irritable, met Lee Hwan’s gaze with just the corners of his mouth turned up.
“Let’s get to the point. White bowtie. What does that mean?”
Kang Dongha, predictably, mocked Lee Hwan’s words.
“Why? Need a bowtie instead of cufflinks?”
He had already anticipated that Kang Dongha wouldn’t respond straightforwardly. Since he was the type to smile even when in a bad mood, pretending not to know something would certainly be no challenge for him.
‘This guy is really ridiculous.’
After sending him here, now he wants Lee Hwan to convince him too? Lee Hwan lamented inwardly.
“Cut the act. Bowtie. White bowtie, you bastard.”
As Lee Hwan grabbed his shirt firmly and asked again, Kang Dongha’s face gradually hardened, starting from his eyes.
Has he finally decided to talk? Or is he just annoyed at having his collar grabbed? Just as Lee Hwan was beginning to wonder, Kang Dongha completely wiped the smile from his face, became serious, and glared at him.
“Tamitree bar, white bowtie. What does that mean? I’m asking for the last time.”
“…”
“Cat got your tongue? It was working fine when you were being cocky.”
He made a small resistance, trying to remove Lee Hwan’s hand. It was a meaningless gesture that didn’t have a speck of impact, but Lee Hwan pushed him and let go of his clothes.
Kang Dongha glanced down at his wrinkled shirt before turning a fierce gaze toward Lee Hwan.
“…Who sent you? Kang Taesung? Kang Dongying?”
“Well. A ghost?”
“I’m not in the mood for Zen riddles.”
“And I’m not in the mood to sit here.”
Kang Dongha gritted his teeth. His coldly hardened face made Lee Hwan feel somewhat satisfied. However, further provoking him would only extend their time in this bar.
Having met his target, Kang Dongha, he now wanted to leave this place. Lee Hwan picked up Kang Dongha’s drink, downed it in one shot, and placed the empty glass in front of him as he answered.
“Kang Dongha.”
“…What?”
“You sent me.”
When he flicked the empty glass with his index finger, it made a muffled “ting” sound. Lee Hwan continued speaking while watching the wobbling glass.
“There was a bit of an accident.”
Kang Dongha, who would normally dismiss such nonsense, somehow maintained a strange expression and kept his mouth shut. Ting, ting, after flicking it a few more times with his index finger, the glass, unable to withstand the force, toppled over and rolled to the edge of the table.
Lee Hwan savored the lingering alcohol taste in his mouth and his eyes flashed slightly. The glass that had crossed the edge dropped down with a plop, but no sound of breaking was heard.
Kang Dongha was looking at Lee Hwan with a serious expression for the first time.
“I came from the future, you know. To save you.”
It was a quiet voice, just loud enough for him to hear. The elegant jazz music playing in the bar soon drowned out Lee Hwan’s voice.
* * *
Lee Hwan sat comfortably in the passenger seat. Riding in Kang Dongha’s car for the first time somehow felt familiar.
Perhaps it wasn’t just a feeling. Lee Hwan easily guessed that he might have actually sat here before.
“I see you haven’t touched semi-awakening yet.”
Indeed, the world 7 years ago was peaceful. Kang Dongha who hadn’t touched semi-awakening or gates. Lee Hwan pulled the seat back, stretched his crumpled legs, and turned his head. In the driver’s seat, where the engine hadn’t even been started, Kang Dongha sat half-dazed.
Honestly, Lee Hwan thought he would need to prove the regression by telling him about various future events. Since there weren’t many memories coming back despite pretending to know everything, he had been considering how to package and deliver information about the future 7 years from now.
However, surprisingly, Kang Dongha seemed to believe Lee Hwan’s words. Or, more precisely, he appeared to be trying to accept something unbelievable.
‘Huh.’
What could the white bowtie possibly mean? What significance could it hold to convince someone as naturally suspicious as Kang Dongha so readily?
At this point, Lee Hwan’s buried curiosity began to resurface. Various speculations swam through his brain.
Maybe this guy is a paranoid patient who has set up some codes that only he would understand, in preparation for meeting himself someday? Does “white bowtie” mean something like, “you’re dead”?
That couldn’t be it. Kang Dongha didn’t seem like the type to waste time on useless delusions. Then perhaps there’s an anecdote tied to it that only he would know.
“…So you’re saying I said that before I died.”
During his contemplation, the same question had already been thrown at him for the third time. In the quiet car without music or engine noise, his voice kept breaking the silence.
Lee Hwan now just nodded without answering.
“I guess I have no choice but to believe you.”
He muttered after a long while. Though it wasn’t clear which part led him to this conclusion, he seemed to have decided to accept Lee Hwan’s words.
Indeed, he was well-versed in survival. Perhaps he had instinctively recognized that this was his path to survival, even without knowing the full story.
‘I don’t know what circumstances would make him accept a story about coming from the future…’
But he had crossed over. Once he was certain of this, Lee Hwan stopped watching the neon signs outside the window and met Kang Dongha’s eyes again.
“The problem is, I don’t trust you.”
Throwing out words with unclear intent, Lee Hwan smiled faintly. Kang Dongha perfectly grasped his meaning and asked:
“…What do you want?”
