AGENT 37

Most of the cars passing through here had either taken a wrong turn and were driving straight through, or were stopping for illegal parking, but this car was different.

The sports car parked directly at the club’s back door, and a man who looked like a loafer stepped out and went straight inside.

“Hmm… Doesn’t look like a courier.”

“Yeah. Looks like a nightclub promoter showing up for work.”

Yongnae silently agreed with the words of Changsik and Pilgu. The loafer-like man had curly hair and was wearing a Hawaiian shirt; he really did look like the nightclub promoters they were talking about. Of course, Yongnae had only ever seen nightclub promoters on TV.

Creak—

About thirty minutes after the curly-haired man went in, the club’s back door opened and he reappeared. Yongnae had thought he was an employee starting his shift, but apparently not.

At that, Yongnae lifted his body from where it had been buried deep in the car seat and brought his face close to the window, which was slightly rolled down. Just in case, he was smelling everyone who came out.

From the curly-haired loafer, the smell of cigarettes came through strongest first.

Then a thick scent of perfume. Sandalwood. It was the scent Yongnae hated most. It felt as if his nose became paralyzed if he kept smelling it.

Also… a faint, sweet yet strange…

“Oh?”

“What is it?”

“It’s that person.”

“That promoter?”

“Yes. The courier, it’s that person.”

The scent of E8. That man was likely the E8 courier. The scent must have wafted out when he took it out to hand it over to the club.

Vroom—

As the curly-haired man drove his red sports car toward the end of the alley, the engine of the black van Yongnae was in also started up.

“Does that bastard have no fear? Does it make sense for a courier to drive such a flashy car?”

“Just a dipshit putting on airs.”

Pilgu and Changsik chuckled as they chased the red sports car crossing the large bridge toward Hong Kong Island.

You guys thought he was a nightclub promoter too until I smelled it and found out.

The words rose to the tip of his tongue, but he was still too embarrassed to open his mouth in front of them.

After entering Hong Kong Island, the sports car began heading straight into a densely populated area, and the path showing on the navigation felt somewhat familiar.

Yongnae pulled out and unfolded the map he had checked at the cafe yesterday. Among the clubs expected to be managed by Yiwon, the one in the center of Hong Kong Island.

Lan Kwai Fong.

Lan Kwai Fong. Yongnae’s prediction was correct. This courier was currently going to deliver E8 to a club under Yiwon’s jurisdiction in Lan Kwai Fong.

“Wow—the teacher really gets it right every time.”

“Seriously. Are you actually some National Intelligence Service agent?”

A National Intelligence Service agent; no, he wasn’t. He was an odor analysis agent for the Indoor Air Quality Division of the Department of Environment. However, feeling a sense of pride as if he had become a capable 007 agent from a movie, Yongnae shrugged his shoulders slightly.

Actually, even when catching the murderer, he liked this sense of achievement. Unlike his daily routine at the research center where he repeated the same work, chasing someone using his sense of smell felt thrilling, as if he were completing an important mission.

He thought he wanted a calm and peaceful life just like everyone else, but he also felt that perhaps running around using his body suited his aptitude.

“He really must be the courier.”

The curly-haired man, who stopped the car in front of the largest club in Lan Kwai Fong, went straight inside. And Yongnae’s group watched that scene from a distance after parking the car.

“But why are we chasing this courier?”

“Are you an idiot? What did you hear when the teacher was talking? Since Yiwon exclusively distributes E8, that courier is going to go to either the manufacturing site or the headquarters.”

“Ahhh—.”

“We wait there, and when the teacher spots that right-hand man, we have to catch him and beat him down.”

Even if he found the man, he would never say a word. He would lie and point out some random tough-looking guy as the right-hand man, then he would find the man separately and head back to the embassy.

…But what should he say when he finds the man separately? “I came to warn you while pretending to help the Black Horse Gang who are trying to catch you? Forget a reward, let’s just have a hug?”

Actually, although he had come this far, he was still questioning himself as to what he had come for. Just to see the man’s face and go? Or to have a kiss with the man just once like in the dream? Or…

‘Ugh, ah, it hurts, it hurts…’

‘I only put a finger in.’

‘It hurts, it hurts so… much…’

Just like in the dream, in my place…

My place… my asshole. Yongnae sat up straight as his waist felt a stinging sensation from the mere imagination, and he struggled to recall exactly what had happened at the club yesterday.

Because while he had heard that men do it with men through the anus, he had never once touched his own anus with his own hand. He had no intention of doing so. Therefore, there was no way he would have put something into his own asshole or touched it just because he was high on drugs yesterday.

If that was the case, someone had touched his anus yesterday. They didn’t just touch it; they poked it. That was why it was stinging like this now.

I haven’t even done it in the front yet, but in the back… Yongnae began to feel incredibly unpleasant at the sensation of having lost his purity.

“Hey, the courier is out.”

“Huh? But where is he going without getting in his car?”

While Yongnae was falling into a hatred directed at someone unknown, Changsik announced that the curly-haired man had come out of the club.

However, the curly-haired man who came out of the club walked right past his parked car, took a quick look around, and then turned straight into the right-hand alley.

“What? Where is he going?”

“Changsik, Pilgu. Go chase him with the teacher.”

The order fell immediately from Jongtae, the hyung-nim. Changsik jumped out of the car even before the order was fully given and ran into the alley at an incredible speed, and Yongnae and Pilgu hurriedly chased after him.

The alley the man had turned into was a street with many entertainment spots, so quite a crowd had gathered even though it was early evening. Because of that, they couldn’t easily find the curly-haired man; while the three of them were turning their heads this way and that, Changsik suddenly ran toward the end of the alley as if he had spotted someone who looked like the curly-haired man far away.

“Hwang Changsik!”

Pilgu immediately called Changsik’s name and chased after him, and Yongnae ran behind him as well.

While running toward the end of the alley for quite a while,

“…Uh?”

Suddenly, that sweet and strange scent faintly brushed the tip of his nose. At that, Yongnae’s legs stopped, and he naturally moved his steps toward the place the scent was coming from.

And the place where the scent grew stronger was inside a small alleyway between flashy bars, a space that looked like only one person could enter. Since the somewhat gloomy alley was not a place with a large crowd like W Club yesterday, Yongnae hesitated a little to enter alone.

He turned his head to look for the Black Horse Gang members, but Changsik had long since disappeared from sight, and Pilgu was already running toward the end of the main alley.

“………”

What if something goes wrong if I go alone? Should I just go get the others? While Yongnae hesitated for a long while, the smell of E8 was growing faint, as if the curly-haired man was moving further inside.

“Ah…”

Eventually, Yongnae took off his tracksuit jacket and threw it at the entrance of the alley, then began to walk inside along the narrow path.