Chapter 1

Surrounded on all sides by apartment complexes, the park remained lively even in the dead of night.

Yi-seon walked alone down the wide, tree-lined avenue. After a while, he turned onto a narrow footpath, where the fresh scent of grass and earth greeted him.

This path through the park was the quickest route between the cram-school district and his apartment complex. After walking it day after day, Yi-seon had come to recognize a few regulars: the pair of Alaskan Malamutes that had padded past earlier, the middle-aged man who always jogged in a purple headband…

“Ah, just shoot it! Take the shot!”

“Are you insane?! Tripping is a foul!”

…Or the high school boys who played basketball in the pocket park.

As he emerged from the trail into the pocket park, boisterous laughter burst across the court. Several boys in short sleeves and uniform trousers were bouncing a basketball. He ran into them from time to time whenever he passed through at this hour.

Their adolescent faces were flushed from exertion beneath the streetlights. Among them, one figure caught Yi-seon’s eye immediately.

Strikingly tall, the boy seemed almost luminous among the sweat-drenched, grimy high schoolers. His broad, straight shoulders and solid athletic build made him impossible to miss. His sharply defined features stood out against his fair, unblemished skin.

At first glance, his handsome face, easy smile, and pierced earlobes might suggest a delinquent, but he was actually the student council president—an academic standout who got along easily with people. As an Extreme Dominant Alpha, there was scarcely a student in the neighborhood who didn’t know who he was.

Yi-seon glanced toward the court and started to slip past along the side path when one of the boys dribbling the ball waved at him. “Huh? It’s Ryu Yi-seon! Heading home?”

It was his classmate Kwon Jeongjin, one of the few people who had made an effort to welcome Yi-seon after his transfer a few months earlier. Yi-seon nodded and stopped.

Jeongjin asked, “Coming back from hagwon?”

“Yeah. Stopped by the study cafe on the way.”

“Where do you go?”

Thud. Thump, thud…

Behind Jeongjin, Student Council President Yeon Mugyeol silently bounced the basketball. He stared at Yi-seon, the easy smile from the game gone and his expression blank. He looked annoyed that their game had been interrupted.

Yi-seon had barely exchanged a few words with Jeongjin and started to turn away when a basketball came flying at him out of nowhere. Thwack! He barely caught it, the impact stinging his palms. Baffled, he lifted his head to see who had thrown it, only to find Yeon Mugyeol striding straight toward him.

Instead of apologizing, Mugyeol said curtly, “Hey.”

The greeting was every bit as abrupt as the interruption.

Sweeping back his damp bangs, Mugyeol grinned. The clean smile and crinkle at the corners of his eyes restored his usual fresh, easy charm.

Too baffled to argue, Yi-seon let out a faint sigh and handed the basketball back. “Yeah. Hey.”

Thump, thump. Mugyeol bounced the ball with one hand. “Going home?”

“Yeah. You?”

“Gonna warm up a bit more before heading out.”

Just then, Kwon Jeongjin called from behind them. “Yi-seon! Want to join in?”

“Join in, my ass. He’s fucking terrible at basketball!” Mugyeol turned around and shot back loudly before Yi-seon could even open his mouth.

Yi-seon bristled. I’m actually good at basketball. He must really hate hanging out with me… The thought still dampened his mood, though after months of Mugyeol’s prickly attitude, it stung less than it once had.

“I’m good. Besides, if I’m too late, my mom will worry.”

Jeongjin made an ‘OK’ circle with his arms over his head. Looking down at the crown of Yi-seon’s head, Mugyeol muttered almost to himself, “Well, Auntie does cherish her youngest son.”

The “Auntie” Mugyeol meant was Yi-seon’s mother. They weren’t actually related; their grandfathers’ friendship had brought the families close, and Mugyeol had grown up calling Yi-seon’s mother ‘Auntie.’

Yi-seon had lived here until the fifth grade of elementary school. Then he had moved to Jeju Island and lived apart from his parents before returning a few months ago as a second-year high school student.

Until Yi-seon moved to Jeju, he and Mugyeol had been inseparable. They did homework, studied, and played together. But with Yi-seon in Jeju and Mugyeol left behind in Seoul, their contact gradually dwindled, and the friendship faded like an old photograph.

The Mugyeol Yi-seon met again years later felt completely different. He was neither close nor warm; if anything, he treated Yi-seon more coldly than he did his other classmates.

Thud, thud… Mugyeol caught the ball he had been bouncing and tucked it under his arm. Leaning down slightly toward Yi-seon, he asked in a casual, even tone, “By the way, did you say you manifested as an Omega?”

Yi-seon glanced behind Mugyeol. The friends playing basketball with him were taking a break, drinking water. Fortunately, they were far enough away that the conversation wouldn’t carry.

“Where’d you hear that?”

“When I had dinner with Auntie the other day.”

“Keep your voice down. No one knows yet except my family.”

It wasn’t strictly a secret, but neither was it something he wanted broadcast everywhere.

Yi-seon had only learned of his manifestation as an Omega recently. Compared with Mugyeol, who had been diagnosed as an Extreme Dominant Alpha before elementary school, Yi-seon had manifested exceptionally late.

When he first received the diagnosis, Yi-seon had been stunned. He had lived as an ordinary Beta, only to learn without warning that his body had a completely different secondary-gender physiology.

Mugyeol tilted his head slightly as he leaned closer to Yi-seon. “Heat coming up?”

“Me?”

What on earth?

At Yi-seon’s bewildered reaction, Mugyeol leaned his head in even closer. “Keep your pheromones under control. If you hit your heat and cause an incident, you’re fucked.”

Maybe Mugyeol meant it as concern in his own warped way, but the low whisper beside Yi-seon’s ear made goosebumps prickle across his skin. Yi-seon rubbed the back of his neck, face stiff, while Mugyeol straightened and gave him a sly grin. “Hard to control because you’re a recessive?”

“What are you even talking about?”

“Though if your pheromones are this faint right before a heat, calling you an Omega at all seems like a stretch…”

Thud. Mugyeol punctuated the warning with a single bounce of the ball. “Don’t come anywhere near me during your heat. Unless you want to get beat half to death for jumping me when you lose your mind.”

“…”

The sheer absurdity left Yi-seon speechless. Yi-seon stood there opening and closing his mouth in disbelief while Mugyeol simply turned his back, apparently satisfied that he had said his piece.

Left alone on the path, Yi-seon stared blankly after Mugyeol. Only then did he snap back to his senses and shout after him, “Hey! Are you out of your mind?!”

Has that bastard lost his fucking marbles? Seriously.

It wasn’t as if every Omega in heat was a rabid predator desperate to devour an Alpha. If anything, Alphas in rut were far more notorious for losing themselves to instinct.

“Yeon Mugyeol, you crazy bastard…”

Deeply annoyed, Yi-seon walked on, muttering curses under his breath.

Mugyeol’s words—no, his bullshit—were wrong on every count.

First of all, he was nowhere near a heat, and even if he were, he couldn’t emit pheromones anyway. His test results classified him as an Extreme Recessive Omega whose pheromone levels were so low he was virtually indistinguishable from a male Beta. In his final consultation, the doctor had even noted that he might never experience a heat in his entire life.

That was precisely why the Omega diagnosis had not unsettled him more than it did.

“Though with pheromones this faint right before a heat, calling you an Omega at all seems like a stretch…”

Did he actually smell something? But my body doesn’t produce pheromones.

Yi-seon raised his forearm and sniffed. A subtle cotton scent lingered—the fabric refresher he had sprayed before leaving the study cafe. Mugyeol must have mistaken the fabric spray for pheromones and spouted all that nonsense.

“Can’t even distinguish smells. And you call yourself an Extreme Dominant Alpha?”

As Yi-seon moved farther from the basketball court, Mugyeol’s group conversation drifted faintly behind him.

“You know Yi-seon? You greeted him last time too… He just transferred, so how do you know him? You’re in a different class.”

To Jeongjin’s question, Mugyeol replied simply, “Knew him briefly back in the day.”

“Back in the day?”

“Yeah. Way before you did. By the way, aren’t you going to guard me?”

“Agh! Crazy bastard!”

Yi-seon glanced back as he left and saw Jeongjin rolling across the asphalt after bouncing off Mugyeol’s shoulder. Catching one last glimpse of Mugyeol shooting toward the hoop, Yi-seon turned away. Swish! The crisp swish of the ball through the net cut cleanly through the night air.

“Knew him briefly back in the day.”

Just some kid he used to know.

Yi-seon admitted it with a hollow ache in his chest: to Yeon Mugyeol, Ryu Yi-seon was nothing more than someone he had known years ago. Even though he had known this ever since their reunion, the realization left a fresh, bitter aftertaste.

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