Chapter 26

Cha Gyuhan had always wondered how Gong Jio could tell he was awake without even looking at him.

This time was no different.

From where Gyuhan lay, all he could see was Gong Jio’s back, yet the man spoke up with utter nonchalance, “Don’t thrash around for nothing unless you want your shoulders dislocated.”

Only after hearing those words did Gyuhan realize his wrists were bound and pulled up over his head. The creaking metallic groan told him he was lying in the guest room.

Gyuhan yanked violently against the bindings, then gave up. These weren’t knots that would yield to brute force; they required technique and finesse. For a man who had breezed through nearly every problem in life with sheer muscle, that was no simple feat. Use my head? Why overcomplicate things when a strong body gets the job done? That simple creed was how Cha Gyuhan had lived his entire life.

“I told you, you’ll dislocate your shoulders.”

Jio offered the warning, but his tone sounded as though he had already anticipated that Gyuhan wouldn’t listen in the slightest.

Turning around, Jio approached with a small box in his hand. Being white, it looked like a first aid kit. He set the box on the nightstand and squeezed out a dab of ointment, but Gyuhan jerked his head away the moment that pale hand reached toward his face.

“First you beat the shit out of me, and now you’re playing nurse?”

“Yeah.”

Well, he’s not wrong…

Gyuhan was struck speechless.

“I took a beating too, but I’m putting ointment on you first.”

“You’re the one who started spouting crazy shit!”

“Do you have proof?”

The deadpan counter-question left Gyuhan gaping in utter disbelief. Seizing that opening, Jio smeared the ointment right across the split corner of Gyuhan’s mouth. Spitting and sputtering in indignant protest, Gyuhan stammered out his defense, “You’re the one who said you wanted to quit! You said you were sick of this!”

“Right. I did say that. But where’s your proof?”

Wait, what kind of bullshit is he spouting now?

Blatant sophistry flew thick and fast, but knowing nothing of the word ‘sophistry’, Gyuhan was plunged into sheer confusion.

“Meanwhile, there’s clear evidence that you smashed down my bedroom door. Legally speaking, I have the upper hand.”

“Are you seriously trying to take me to court right now…?”

“Not really. I just felt like being petty.”

“Petty about what?!”

“About the sheer futility of wasting over twenty years spinning my wheels only to end up with nothing, and realizing that everything I ever said to you was treated like a dog barking.[1]”

“When the hell did I ever treat what you said like a dog barking?”

That accusation was truly unfair. It stung far worse than Jio pretending he’d never said what he’d said. If his wrists had been free, Gyuhan would have pounded his chest in raw frustration.

Gong Jio stared in silence at Gyuhan, who glared back with wide, incensed eyes. Beneath that unclouded, piercing gaze, Gyuhan found himself stifled in an entirely different way.

After a long while, Jio spoke. “Cha Gyuhan. I’m quitting.”

The heavy drop that struck his chest—was it shock, panic, a sense of loss, or the chill of a cold setting in? Gyuhan’s bare pectoral muscles heaved sharply with a ragged gasp. Jio let out a dry, mirthless scoff.

“No way.”

Before he had even exhaled the deep breath he had just pulled in, Gyuhan spoke in a rapid rush, “You don’t even have a resignation letter. You can’t quit.”

At those words, Jio reached over and slid the nightstand drawer open. What emerged was a resignation letter. They say every salaryman carries a resignation letter tucked close to their heart, but Gyuhan had never dreamed Gong Jio would be one of them—much less keep one stashed inside a guest room nightstand drawer.

Gyuhan glared at the envelope Jio thrust out for him to see. The three neat characters spelling out Resignation Letter on the front grated savagely on his nerves.

“Hold it steady.”

“What?”

Jio didn’t understand the command Gyuhan growled through gritted teeth. Without leaving any opening for hesitation, Gyuhan acted on pure, unadulterated instinct. Engaging his powerful core, he surged upward, clamped his teeth onto the corner of the resignation envelope, and whipped his head violently from side to side. He threw so much force into it that a low, guttural growl ripped from his throat. Tearing the envelope horizontally right down the middle, he looked every bit like a rabid hound.

Spitting the shredded halves onto the floor with a pui, Gyuhan barked furiously at Jio, “Quit? Like hell you’re quitting! Is that half-assed resolve all you had when you agreed to work for our company? What the fuck is wrong with you suddenly? Did someone give you a better offer? What did they promise? I’ll treat you better! Or is it suddenly too humiliating to work under a friend?!”

Jio’s brow furrowed faintly.

“Are the working conditions the problem?!”

“Yeah,” Jio answered curtly, sweeping his hair back. “The working environment is the issue. It’s so fucking terrible it’s a problem.”

“Fuck’s sake… You should’ve said something sooner! What is it? The benefits?!”

“The working environment I need is one without you in it.”

Every single word Jio ground out through clenched teeth hammered against Gyuhan’s forehead like a rhythmic blow. Gyuhan blinked dumbly.

“You’re the problem because you’re there.”

“Uh, w-what…?”

Because Cha Gyuhan was so simple-minded, those words registered to him as nothing more than Gong Jio hates Cha Gyuhan to death. Jio knew full well that Gyuhan would interpret it that way. What else could he expect from a fool who had brushed off even a direct confession with, “Hey, you bastard, why get all mushy with words?”

Right. That was the moment.

The memory sent a sharp spike of blood pressure surging to Jio’s temples, veins bulging along his forehead as he held his breath.

That was indeed the turning point. The real issue wasn’t just that Cha Gyuhan had a male sex partner; it was that from that exact second on, fuck, he was so overwhelmingly, blindingly furious… and that was why…

“What if the problem isn’t working under a friend, but wanting to pin that friend under me instead? What are you going to do then?”

Jio laid it out in blunt, graphic terms calibrated specifically to Gyuhan’s wavelength.

He made sure to cut him off before Gyuhan could spout some skull-splitting nonsense like, Isn’t that the same thing? or I’ll give you a promotion.

“Gyuhan-ah. None of my bones are broken. Remember when I told you earlier that I was going to fuck you senseless?”

“Uh, w-what…?”

“Right. I figured you’d forget after passing out. But don’t worry. Even if you pass out again, you won’t be able to forget if you wake up with me still buried inside you. I might have missed the preview, but I’ll make damn sure you get a thorough review.”

Shrugging off his bathrobe, Jio climbed onto the bed. Reaching into the white case, he pulled out a large bottle of lube. Gyuhan whipped his head around in confusion, wondering what the hell that was doing in there, only to realize the box lacked a Red Cross emblem—it wasn’t a first aid kit at all, but a sex kit disguised as one.

When a panicked Gyuhan thrashed his legs in protest, Jio dropped his knees down and pinned them. Bone ground hard against bone, inflicting sharp agony.

“Aargh, ah, hey! Ow, fuck, it hurts! Ah, my leg! My ankles! You’re crushing them!”

“Gyuhan-ah.”

“Aargh!”

“Cha Gyuhan.”

Jio was far too sharp. He immediately clocked that Gyuhan was hamming up his pain on purpose just to squirm out of the situation. Cocking his fist, Jio drove it straight into the side of Gyuhan’s face that hadn’t received ointment.

“Fuck! I almost bit my tongue off!”

“You didn’t, right? Good. You have to suck my cock in a bit.”

“W-What?!”

“Gyuhan-ah.”

Jio squeezed a massive amount of gel onto his palm right in front of him. Hearing the wet, dripping sound, Gyuhan parted the fingers of the hand Jio held over his face and stared wide-eyed at the clear semi-liquid—not because he didn’t know what it was, but because of the sheer, absurd volume being dispensed.

C-Crazy bastard. Just how much is he squeezing out?!

“I tend to be pretty filthy in bed,” Jio murmured. “Thinking about you just brings it out in me naturally.”

“Wh-What are you even talking about…?”

“Turns out, treating you like even more of a dog is what you deserve. Your former fuck buddy has quite the reputation. So I asked myself how to train someone whose palate was ruined on stimulating junk food right from the start. My conclusion was that if I turn into even filthier trash, you’ll lap it right up. It might not be good for your health, but since your only redeeming virtue is your stamina, you’d better hold out well.”

Gyuhan swallowed a dry gulp at the detached warning.

He could tell it was neither a joke nor a bluff. Goosebumps erupted across his skin. Nursing the stinging ache inside his cheek with his tongue, Gyuhan ventured cautiously, “I-Is that why you punched me just now?”

“No. That was just because I was annoyed.”

With a wet squelch, the bottle emptied completely. He had squeezed out so much that thick ropes of gel trickled down his wrist. Tossing the empty container aside with a flick, Jio lowered the hand that had been shielding Gyuhan’s face.

“That was because I was genuinely pissed.”

Jio’s uncovered face came into view.

Having built a wall against studying and books his entire life, Gyuhan’s eyesight was phenomenal. Not a single trace of astigmatism, either. Within his crystal-clear vision, Gong Jio stood out with startling clarity.

“Because I’m so fucking furious I can barely stand it.”

There was Gong Jio, silent tears steadily streaming down his cheeks.

Zz… zt?

No. ZZZ-T!

Had his ankles not been pinned beneath Jio’s knees, Gyuhan’s legs would have bucked straight up. His chest grew so heavy his breath seized, his head spun blankly, his tongue stiffened into lead, his pupils dilated, and all the strength drained from his body in an instant.

And so, Gyuhan remained motionless even as Jio reached a hand between his parted thighs.

No, the truth was that he simply couldn’t do a single thing.

Zzzt.

The lightning bolt hadn’t struck alone. It crashed down in a deafening roar of thunder alongside the torrential downpour of Gong Jio’s tears.

[END of VOLUME 1]