Chapter 106

“Hmm…”

“He’s been sustaining himself by swallowing liquid dungeon rations or emergency energy pills. However… his physical condition really isn’t good,” Kwon Shinju confessed.

Even for a profoundly healthy S-Rank Hunter, surviving purely on liquids without consuming actual food for years was an incredible strain on the body.

“But now that you’re here, Hunter Nam Shin-hoo, won’t that get better too?”

“I don’t know about that.”

“Pardon?”

Leaving the bewildered young Guild Master behind, Nam Shin-hoo pushed himself off the sofa. He honestly had no idea whether Kwon Haeju’s condition would improve or spiral into something even worse. However, his brief conversation with Kwon Shinju had illuminated a crucial piece of the puzzle.

He finds it incredibly difficult to chew. He severely struggles whenever any object touches his mouth. And he violently avoided kissing me.

Every single clue pointed to one horrifying conclusion.

Nam Shin-hoo wanted to strangle himself.

“Haa…” he exhaled roughly.

“Is something wrong? Are you feeling unwell…?” Kwon Shinju asked anxiously.

“I’m sorry, but could you please head back for today? I’ll make sure to handle Kwon Haeju carefully. Plus, I really should get out of this bathrobe,” Nam Shin-hoo requested.

“Uh, yes. Of course.”

Gently patting the flustered young man’s shoulder, Nam Shin-hoo guided him to the entryway. He promised they would catch up properly next time, explicitly swearing Kwon Shinju to secrecy regarding today’s conversation, before finally seeing him out.

Left entirely alone on the first floor once more, Nam Shin-hoo stared at his own reflection in the window glass. Staring back was an incredibly selfish, hideous face. He looked absolutely pathetic.

“I’m going crazy.”

Kwon Haeju couldn’t chew anything.

The reason was devastatingly obvious: in their final moments inside the EX-Rank dungeon, Nam Shin-hoo had forcefully shoved the Return Stone into Kwon Haeju’s mouth to forcibly activate it. Ever since then, the younger man firmly believed that the very act of biting down was the reason he had abandoned Nam Shin-hoo to die.

Crushed beneath that agonizing guilt, Kwon Haeju had spent four entire years unable to eat, punishing himself by subsisting entirely on liquids.

Tears pricked at the corners of his eyes.

Nam Shin-hoo hadn’t shed a single tear even when he was fully prepared to die, yet he felt entirely capable of breaking down and weeping right now. He felt so incredibly pathetic, and his heart broke so profoundly for Kwon Haeju.

“…”

Scrubbing his face roughly with both hands, Nam Shin-hoo lifted his head. He had absolutely no right to collapse here and cry his eyes out.

His face hardening with grim resolve, he climbed the stairs to the second floor.

The quiet bedroom was filled only with the faint, rhythmic sound of breathing. Having been knocked out by the potent sedative, Kwon Haeju was resting far more peacefully than he ever did while awake.

A life where sleep was completely impossible without dangerous drugs. Four agonizing years entirely unable to bite or chew anything.

Nam Shin-hoo gently brushed the dark bangs from the sleeping man’s forehead. Beneath the swept-back hair, his skin was slick with cold sweat. Even the forced unconsciousness granted by the chemicals wasn’t a peaceful rest.

“…”

He had been far too complacent.

He had naively assumed that Kwon Haeju would naturally stabilize over time, believing that his mere physical presence would act as an automatic cure. He had foolishly thought that if he just treated the younger man a little more affectionately and provided enough reassurance, Kwon Haeju would organically revert to his old self.

Reality was far more brutal.

Kwon Haeju was already far past the point of natural recovery. He was exactly like a massive, rotting old tree whose roots had completely withered away; someone had simply poured concrete into the hollowed-out trunk just to maintain the external shape. If Nam Shin-hoo left him alone, that fragile, decaying shell of a body and mind would eventually shatter completely, and he would easily throw his life away without a second thought—just like he had earlier today.

Where exactly is the answer to this problem…?

It was undoubtedly the most difficult question Nam Shin-hoo had ever faced in his entire life.

“I have to try absolutely everything,” he muttered resolutely.

Glancing at the clock, Nam Shin-hoo realized it was still only the afternoon; the sun hadn’t even set. Given that Kwon Haeju had undeniably developed a massive tolerance to the sedatives, he would likely wake up long before the day was over.

Nam Shin-hoo looked down at his white bathrobe. The wait for the younger man to wake up was going to feel agonizingly long.

***

It was late in the evening.

Just before the clock struck midnight, the tips of Kwon Haeju’s fingers finally twitched.

He slowly opened his eyes. Staring blankly at the faint moonlight spilling through the window, he blinked sluggishly. He felt as though he had been simultaneously wandering through a horrific nightmare and a sickeningly sweet dream.

Acting purely on instinct, his hand blindly reached out to grope the space beside him. The reassuring warmth he desperately craved was missing. Massaging his violently throbbing temples, Kwon Haeju forced his heavy body upright.

His hand, frantically digging into his inventory to retrieve an antidote, was suddenly caught.

“Are you awake?”

“…”

“Do you want something to drink? You must be thirsty.”

Kwon Haeju immediately abandoned the inventory and desperately reached toward that welcoming voice. A warm body pressed against his heavily drugged frame. Only then did his lungs finally remember how to draw a proper breath. Ignoring the offered glass of water, Kwon Haeju buried his face deep into Nam Shin-hoo’s shoulder. The overwhelmingly familiar scent instantly anchored his shattered mind.

The exact second Nam Shin-hoo’s signal vanished from the empathetic ring, the entire world had abruptly stopped. His vision had instantly bled into stark black and white, and every single sound echoing around him had devolved into garbled, incomprehensible alien noise.

He honestly had no idea how he had managed to survive the past four years without him; those brief few minutes when the ring’s signal died had felt infinitely longer and far more agonizing than the entirety of that absence.

Feeling the gentle hand softly stroking the back of his head, the suffocating tension coiled inside Kwon Haeju slowly unspooled. Swaying unsteadily under the lingering influence of the drugs, he surrendered his entire weight against Nam Shin-hoo.

Even amidst all this madness, Nam Shin-hoo remained unfailingly gentle.

Kwon Haeju was acutely aware that he wasn’t normal. Furthermore, he explicitly knew that Nam Shin-hoo’s current affection was largely driven by a mixture of profound pity and a heavy sense of responsibility toward the future.

Kwon Haeju fully intended to exploit those exact feelings.

It was a fundamentally selfish decision. He was the one who had selfishly carved Nam Shin-hoo into his heart. He was the one who had practically forced Nam Shin-hoo to take him to the United States. And ultimately, he was the one who had selfishly escaped the EX-Rank dungeon using Nam Shin-hoo’s Return Stone.

He was painfully aware of exactly how cowardly it was to violently chain Nam Shin-hoo to his side by threatening his own suicide. Yet, he couldn’t stop. He was completely incapable of surviving another second in a world without Nam Shin-hoo.

“Kwon Haeju,” Nam Shin-hoo called out softly.

“Yes.”

“Could you lift your head for a second?”

He obediently raised his face. Backlit by the pale, silvery moonlight, the older man looking down at him was hauntingly beautiful and entirely composed. The delicate shadow of his long eyelashes fluttered softly against his pale skin.

Even after several years, it remained an undeniable truth: Kwon Haeju had never encountered a single person who shined brighter or possessed greater strength than the man before him. Neither physically, nor mentally.

As if possessed, he found himself entirely captivated by Nam Shin-hoo’s features. It was the very first time he had ever seen the man’s face this clearly, this closely, in proper lighting. In the past, he had only ever watched him while he slept or blindly traced his features with his fingertips in the dark.

“…!”

Something hot and wet suddenly pressed against his mouth. As a foreign tongue forcefully parted his lips and invaded, Kwon Haeju’s entire mind went violently blank. Acting purely on terrified reflex, he brutally shoved the body pressed against his own. The sheer, desperate force nearly sent Nam Shin-hoo tumbling entirely off the mattress.

“What are you doing?!” Kwon Haeju gasped.

“You still have quite a bit of strength left. I thought you’d be completely drained from the drugs,” Nam Shin-hoo noted calmly.

Kwon Haeju frantically scrubbed the back of his hand over his lips, desperately trying to erase the lingering warmth. Closing the distance once more, Nam Shin-hoo caught that trembling hand. Without a shred of hesitation, he firmly pinned both of Kwon Haeju’s wrists against the mattress.

Trapping the heavier man completely between his arms, Nam Shin-hoo stared down at him with a faint smile. Only then did Kwon Haeju truly register Nam Shin-hoo’s appearance. He was still wearing the exact same white bathrobe from earlier that afternoon.

As Nam Shin-hoo shifted his weight, the lapels of the robe fell open, fully exposing his flat chest. The moment Kwon Haeju’s frantic gaze snagged on the small, pink peak of a nipple, he violently averted his eyes.

“Kwon Haeju. Do you not want to kiss me anymore?” Nam Shin-hoo asked softly.

“What? What are you talking—”

“Is it because I violently forced the Return Stone into your mouth?”

Kwon Haeju’s entire body went rigid. It was the one horrific truth he desperately didn’t want discovered—alongside his physical inability to eat. He knew the incredibly perceptive Nam Shin-hoo would inevitably figure it out someday, but it wasn’t supposed to be now. He needed to hide it until he had successfully forged much stronger, unbreakable shackles.

He was terrified that Nam Shin-hoo would be profoundly disappointed in him. He absolutely refused to let the man who had sacrificed his own life to entrust him with the future discover that he was actually a pathetic, fragile coward who had completely shattered under the weight of it.

“You can’t even deny it,” Nam Shin-hoo noted quietly.

“…It is my own personal issue. You do not need to concern yourself with it,” Kwon Haeju gritted out.

“Yeah. I’m not going to.”

Keeping Kwon Haeju firmly pinned to the mattress, Nam Shin-hoo straddled his hips and fluidly slipped the bathrobe off his shoulders. His pale, naked body was entirely exposed beneath the soft glow of the moonlight. Pinning the completely panicked younger man’s shoulders, Nam Shin-hoo leaned down.

Kwon Haeju felt exactly like he was suffocating. He was absolutely terrified that Nam Shin-hoo would feel the violent, erratic hammering of his heart against his palms; he was too paralyzed by fear to even attempt to struggle.

“Just like I selfishly did whatever I wanted when I threw you out of that dungeon alone, I plan to resolve this however I damn well please,” Nam Shin-hoo whispered.

His fingertips gently traced the curve of Kwon Haeju’s cheek. The one who inflicted such a horrific wound and profound trauma had a fundamental obligation to take absolute responsibility for it.

“Open your mouth.”

“What are you saying…!”

“Well, the exact order isn’t entirely important anyway.”

Leaning his upper body down, Nam Shin-hoo pressed his face flush against Kwon Haeju’s neck. The sudden shock of hot breath ghosting across his skin made Kwon Haeju’s shoulders jolt violently. However, trapped firmly beneath Nam Shin-hoo’s unyielding hands, he couldn’t twitch another muscle. Heavily weighed down by the lingering sedatives, his body completely refused to obey his frantic commands.

Scowling fiercely, Kwon Haeju glared up at the older man. He was utterly incapable of comprehending the completely baffling situation unfolding before his eyes.

“Do you hate it that much?” Nam Shin-hoo asked.

Despite the question, he didn’t stop. He deliberately nuzzled his nose against the sensitive skin of Kwon Haeju’s neck while his firm thumb smoothly unfastened the buttons of the younger man’s shirt. He slowly swept his hand across the fully exposed, muscular chest. Brushing against the smooth skin as lightly as a feather, his fingertips pressed deeply into the hollow beneath Kwon Haeju’s collarbone.

“Then you can just hate me,” Nam Shin-hoo whispered against his skin.

At those words, Nam Shin-hoo gently rubbed his thumb against Kwon Haeju’s stiffly frozen brow. While he deliberately maintained a leisurely, unhurried facade, his heart was racing frantically. His mind was entirely consumed by a single, desperate objective.

The ultimate goal of this aggressively sudden behavior.

A slow, deliberate smile bloomed across Nam Shin-hoo’s lips.

“Be a good boy. Once we’re finished, I’ll listen to any complaints you have.”

The goal was simple: to violently overwrite the past. He was going to sear a memory so overwhelmingly intense into Kwon Haeju’s mind that it completely obliterated the suffocating trauma holding him hostage.