SWAP 30

Ye Juyeol was now half-sobbing.

“I never imagined in my dreams that sunbae-nim would have watched my movie. I could die right now without any regrets, reg… huff. I, I am truly a huge fan. I’ve watched every single one of your works without exception, from your debut film to the recently released <The 3rd Round Funeral>!”

“Yes, um, thank you… but.”

Could you just calm down a little bit? Seoul, who found himself being pushed backward repeatedly regardless of his own will, suffered yet another scratch to his pride. He tried his best to maintain his composure during this “Paper Doll Incident: Phase 2,” but Ye Juyeol showed absolutely no sign of calming down.

“I really, really wanted to meet you. I know I’m not quite at your level yet, but I thought it would be so great if I could at least run into you once on a project! When the PD said I could look forward to the opposing pair, wow, whoa… to think I’d meet you like this, I really!”

The grip on his hands was powerful. It didn’t hurt, but because Juyeol was holding on so tight, Seoul couldn’t break free at all. Already accustomed to this kind of situation thanks to Saheon, Seoul decided to simply give up. He felt that struggling wouldn’t solve anything anyway, and he could tell that Juyeol didn’t have any particular ulterior motives.

However, the moment he was pushed back one step further, he couldn’t help but part his lips.

“Juyeol, please, just a little bit of calm…”

“What are you doing?”

Thud. Just as he felt something solid touch his back, a familiar low voice echoed near his ear.

He didn’t even have to look to know who it was. Seo Saheon, who had positioned himself behind Seoul before anyone noticed, looked down at the ridiculous antics with an expressionless face. Thanks to him, Seoul was no longer pushed backward, and he involuntarily let the tension drain from his shoulders. It was a movement he wasn’t even consciously aware of.

Of course, only Saheon noticed it. He easily supported Seoul as the body that had been stiff from resisting Juyeol’s weight relaxed and leaned into his embrace. Holding Seoul’s waist with one hand to keep him from falling, Saheon’s gaze slowly moved forward. Specifically, toward Ye Juyeol, who was still clutching Seoul’s hands.

The first person to react was Yun Hyeok.

Since the situation had unfolded so instantly, he had missed the timing to intervene, so he quickly jabbed Ye Juyeol in the ribs with his elbow.

A groan of pain—ugh—was heard, but it couldn’t be helped. Yun Hyeok, who had a fairly good intuition, instinctively realized that he had to separate his friend from Lee Seoul. Well, regardless of intuition, anyone who saw that face of Seo Saheon would have no choice but to shut their mouth and back away.

“Hey…!”

As Yun Hyeok pressured him like a ventriloquist without moving his lips much, Ye Juyeol fortunately came to his senses shortly after.

Grit-teeth Yun Hyeok vowed to one day thoroughly fix that habit of Juyeol’s, where he charges in like an 8-ton truck once he goes out of control, as he whispered in a small voice, “Hands.”

Huh? Ye Juyeol, blinking his eyes, looked straight ahead. Upon confirming his own hands tightly—grip—holding onto Seoul’s, he recoiled in horror and jumped back. He had been so busy pouring out his fan heart that he’d had no awareness of his own actions. Raising both hands high, he asked urgently.

“Ack, eek! I’m sorry, I’m sorry…! Did I happen to hurt you?”

It seemed he was aware that his grip was strong.

Seoul, finally liberated from Juyeol, blinked dazed for a moment. He couldn’t wrap his head around the constantly changing situation. One moment he was pushing forward recklessly, and the next, Ye Juyeol was whining with a tearful face and drooping eyebrows. With his shoulders slumped down, he looked exactly like a puppy abandoned on a rainy day.

At that, Seoul couldn’t hold it back anymore and burst into laughter.

It was because the way this large man crumpled himself up and acted so out of character reminded him of someone else standing right behind him.

“It’s okay. It didn’t hurt at all. Are you feeling a bit more calm now?”

Seoul began to soothe Ye Juyeol, gently waving the hands that were now free to move. In truth, aside from being a bit surprised, it was nothing. Furthermore, as an actor, he was in a position where he should be thankful for someone liking him so passionately.

At Seoul’s voice, which was laced with laughter, Juyeol nodded his head rapidly. It was such a violent movement that one might wonder if his head would fall off, which completely undermined the credibility of his answer, but… Seoul decided to just assume that was simply his personality.

Fortunately, Ye Juyeol stopped nodding just before his head rolled onto the floor and stole a glance this way.

Since he seemed to be checking if Seoul’s feelings were truly not hurt, Seoul gave him a beaming smile, but instead of feeling relieved, the other man’s expression became even more subtle. It was the same for Yun Hyeok standing next to him.

……?

Seoul, tilting his cheek at the question mark that naturally popped up, soon realized something. Come to think of it, the two of them hadn’t even introduced themselves to Saheon yet. It was highly unlikely they were old acquaintances. Knowing Saheon’s disastrous social circle in the entertainment industry as well as his own, Seoul quickly turned his head, and as expected, their eyes met squarely.

I thought he was being unusually quiet.

The sight of him standing there silently watching only Seoul was so vivid it made his head ache.

Far from thinking of greeting them first, Saheon made it blatantly obvious that he didn’t have a shred of interest in the other party. This wasn’t a private gathering; the cameras were continuously rolling. Regardless of what happened later, they couldn’t ruin the first meeting, so Seoul put some pressure into his eyes.

“Saheon-ah. You should introduce yourself too.”

The voice itself was soft, but there was a certain weight to the words.

Upon receiving Seoul’s gaze, which meant This is the variety show you said you wanted to do, Saheon, who had been silent without any particular retort, shifted his dark pupils toward the front.

Unlike when they were fixed on Seoul, not a single grain of sincerity could be found in the black pupils looking at the two men. That face, appearing somewhat bored, was actually the side of Seo Saheon that the public encountered most often.

Even though it was just their eyes meeting, a chill somehow ran down their spines.

Without even realizing they were gulping down dry saliva, Ye Juyeol and Yun Hyeok straightened their posture with nervous hearts.

They had only heard about him through rumors; today was the first time they had seen Seo Saheon in the flesh as well. The man, who easily exceeded the eye level of Ye Juyeol—who wasn’t easily outdone in terms of height—belonged to the category of being quite large for a model.

Even though he was just wearing a T-shirt, one could almost naturally visualize the body hidden beneath the clothes. His moderately tanned skin and the veins bulging on the back of his hands were strangely sexual. Perhaps it was because of that somewhat languid atmosphere. He truly lived up to his reputation as a celebrity who drove both haters and fans crazy.

To begin with, wasn’t his nickname “Wrecker’s Muse”?

Even Yun Hyeok, who as an idol had heard every bizarre nickname imaginable, was encountering that term for the first time in his life.

He wondered if “Wrecker” and “Muse” were words that could even be put together, but Seo Saheon had made it happen. All sorts of rumors and gossip sprang up like an eternal spring just by him standing still, and the intensity was so severe that any other celebrity would have decided to retire.

Is it any wonder there’s even a tip floating around called “The Celebrity Whose YouTube Videos You Must Not Click”?

It meant that the moment you clicked a Seo Saheon-related short on YouTube, your algorithm was basically ruined.

In the early days of his debut, it was at a level almost comparable to political agitation, but now it had been cleaned up significantly after filing lawsuit after lawsuit after lawsuit. Of course, the public nowadays didn’t even click on thumbnails related to Seo Saheon.

If one’s image were this much of a mess, work would usually dry up, but that wasn’t the case for him.

Not long after debuting as a magazine model, he was immediately on the runway, swept up various pictorials and commercial shoots, and even became the first Asian ambassador for Carde.

To top it off, in the midst of all that, a drama he suddenly appeared in became a massive hit.

If a Goddess of Luck existed, she would certainly be standing behind Seo Saheon.

“…”

The self-introduction of such a man.

Not knowing why they were so nervous, the two men gulped again in a manner that was almost twin-like. Rumor has it his personality is that foul… but since the subject was that Seo Saheon, the truth was impossible to know.

Moreover, there was something else that had been bothering them for a while now.

Namely, that hand that showed no intention whatsoever of leaving Seoul’s waist.

They understood he had grabbed him to keep him from falling… but then… if he didn’t fall, shouldn’t he let go now…? As they glanced with confused eyes, unable to say it out loud, Saheon also lowered his gaze as if he had felt it. Just as they were running a rational circuit, wondering if he perhaps hadn’t realized he was still doing that…

“I’m also a fan of Lee Seoul.”

Saheon, who spat out an absurd self-introduction that no one expected, pulled Seoul’s waist even closer to himself and spoke.

It was an action that was virtually indistinguishable from a display of dominance.