PAO 14

To clear the air, Seowon casually shook his hands.

“Stop setting a mood for no reason. Is there something you want from me?”

“…”

“I’ll grant you anything, so tell me.”

“…Will you really grant me anything?”

“Except for what’s in the contract.”

Seowon treated Junghoo’s sudden seriousness as if he had some kind of ulterior motive. And sure enough, Junghoo, who had spoken with a straight face, was trying to act nonchalant, but the corner of his mouth was twitching.

Only then did the heavy atmosphere from a moment ago lighten a bit, and Seowon set the empty can aside and opened a new one.

At the chicken place, he hadn’t been able to drink much because he was paying attention to the others, but now the alcohol was finally starting to kick in. If it weren’t for that look in Junghoo’s eyes, the one that wanted to eat him alive, he could have drunk more freely.

“Can you wear my underwear just once?”

“Yeah, no.”

“You said you’d grant me anything.”

“I didn’t say I’d wear them.”

“I won’t ask to see.”

“Then why are you asking me to wear them?”

“Even if I can’t see, I can imagine, can’t I?”

Seowon let out a dumbfounded laugh, then shot a glare at Junghoo. He was about to snap at him for why he thought like that, but his unusually pale face caught his eye.

The healthy lunatic had become a sickly lunatic.

The conversation, which had started with size and then moved on to underwear, was Seowon’s fault for not stopping it from the beginning.

“I’m not showing you.”

Until Junghoo nodded with a bright smile, Seowon was only focused on the act of wearing them.

Junghoo pressed his throbbing forehead. As his mind wavered from the alcohol, his pheromones were continuously in turmoil. He couldn’t suppress them with medicine, so he had to endure them with his sheer willpower.

When he had released his pheromones to figure out Minsung’s secondary gender, his mind had seemed to clear for a brief moment, but he suffered from the side effects of it. It was difficult to control the pheromones that were trying to move against his will.

So he locked up his pheromones again. The only person with him was Seowon, and Seowon was a beta, so he wouldn’t be able to feel them, but he locked them up with even more effort. It was partly because of what was written in the contract, but he also didn’t want to get the pheromones he loathed as much as his own secondary gender on Seowon.

He said he was waiting for Seowon to become an omega, but in reality, he didn’t want him to present. It was better for him to never feel these damn pheromones in his entire life.

Junghoo shook his head to clear his wavering vision and lifted his head. Seowon’s Adam’s apple, exposed as he drank his beer, bobbed prominently. For some reason, today he felt a particularly strong thirst to bite Seowon’s neck. Junghoo bit his own tingling lips and forced his gaze away.

His heart felt like it was pounding like a pump, and then his vision wavered. It was as if the locked-up pheromones had rammed into his head, and he couldn’t get a grip on himself.

This kind of pain was familiar, but he didn’t want to show it to Seowon. Forcing a wide smile, he spouted whatever came to mind at Seowon.

“My underwear is in the bathroom.”

Even at Seowon’s contemptuous gaze, Junghoo maintained a faint smile.

It hasn’t been long since I started living with Seowon…
I wish I could have held out a little longer.

“Son of a bitch.”

Seowon let out a hollow laugh, then ground out a curse.

So this is why he asked me to wear them.

He thought it was ridiculous to be gauging whose dick was bigger without even having seen it, but for him to reveal it like this. It was just a way of bragging that he was bigger, so Seowon irritably pushed Junghoo’s underwear aside, then washed his hands and came out.

“Did you wear them?”

“Yeah.”

Seowon, with only one side of his lips twitching, lied that he did. It was purely out of his own spite that he deceived him instead of scolding him and asking why.

“Your dick is fucking huge. Happy now? I was wondering why you suddenly mentioned underwear…”

Seowon stopped his scolding and stared intently at Junghoo’s face.

“Are you okay?”

Seowon raised his hand and pointed at Junghoo’s face. Junghoo, not knowing anything, touched his own face. As he looked at the warm liquid on his fingertips, Seowon said.

“You have a nosebleed.”

“So I do.”

Junghoo’s action of firmly pinching the bridge of his nose, acting completely unfazed even after seeing the blood, was so calm that it was Seowon, the one watching, who became anxious.

“Why the sudden nosebleed?”

“I was just sitting still, imagining you wearing my underwear.”

Junghoo answered in a nasal voice, pinching his nose tightly.

“Hey, you crazy bastard. If you get a nosebleed from that… what am I supposed to do.”

Seowon’s voice, which he had raised to scold Junghoo, gradually trailed off. The amount of blood was too much to have been caused by just imagination.

“Hey.”

Seowon pushed Junghoo’s hand away and pulled at his own shirt to pinch his nose.

“I think this is serious.”

“It’s nothing.”

“What do you mean, it’s nothing?”

Suddenly, the conversation he had with Yoo Taeha earlier came to mind. When he mentioned Junghoo being sick, was he perhaps referring to a situation like this?

“Are you really sick?”

At Seowon’s serious question, the smile that had been forcibly plastered on Junghoo’s face vanished.

The nosebleed didn’t stop the entire way to the hospital. From the moment they realized the gravity of the situation, neither Seowon nor Junghoo said a word.

“I knew this would happen.”

Yoo Taeha, who had come down after being contacted, kept clicking his tongue while administering first aid.

“Why would you even say you’re going when you won’t even last a week…”

“Stop it.”

At Junghoo’s low voice, Yoo Taeha couldn’t say more and just sighed. After taking off his gloves, Yoo Taeha looked at Junghoo’s and Seowon’s messy, bloodstained clothes with a troubled expression. As if he didn’t like that look, Junghoo carelessly tossed aside the cotton ball he was using to wipe the blood from his face.

“I can go now, right?”

“Go where? You need to be hospitalized.”

“What hospitalization for just a nosebleed.”

As Junghoo stood up from his seat with an annoyed expression and staggered, Yoo Taeha supported him to keep him from falling.

“You’re dismissing it as just a nosebleed? You would have needed two packs of blood if you got a transfusion for that nosebleed.”

“I’m leaving.”

“Hey, Yoo Junghoo… Never mind, go.”

Taeha stepped back as if he couldn’t win. Then he made eye contact with Seowon, who had been standing quietly so as not to be a disturbance.

“Seowon.”

“Yes, hyung.”

“Can you talk with hyung for a bit?”

“Ah…”

Without realizing it, Seowon glanced at Junghoo. The atmosphere clearly indicated that they were going to talk about Junghoo. Junghoo seemed to have sensed that too, as he narrowed his brow and blocked Yoo Taeha’s view of Seowon.

“What are you trying to say?”

“You just get an IV.”

Yoo Taeha pushed Junghoo’s chest with a firm hand, laying him down on the bed, and then rolled up his sleeve. And as he was about to insert the needle for the IV himself, Junghoo reached out to stop him but was blocked by Seowon.

“Just get this and then go.”

While Seowon’s blood-stained hand blocked Junghoo’s, Yoo Taeha quickly connected the IV.

“Get it.”

At Seowon’s words, repeated for emphasis, Junghoo glared at the IV with eyes that said he wanted to tear it out immediately, then lowered his hand.

“I’m only getting this.”

At Junghoo’s question, which was seeking confirmation again, Seowon stepped back as if to say, do whatever you want. Then he followed Yoo Taeha outside, and Yoo Taeha, who had been watching the people passing by in the hallway, turned around.

Junghoo’s older cousin, whom he had known since childhood, Yoo Taeha, who had always been kind and treated him affectionately with a gentle smile—his hardened expression was unfamiliar.

“Seowon, you saw earlier, right?”

The subject was omitted, but he knew at once who he was talking about.

“I’d like for Junghoo to be hospitalized, but he won’t listen. I can’t break that damn… stubbornness.”

“Is Junghoo really unwell? Does he perhaps have a serious illness?”

“…His body is not well.”

Reading Yoo Taeha’s hesitation, Seowon’s expression fell. To disappear suddenly and then reappear, he should have at least been healthy. Even from Seowon’s perspective, Junghoo’s recent condition hadn’t been good, and it seemed it wasn’t just a simple cold that would pass.

“Can you perhaps tell me what’s going on?”

“I think it would be better to ask Junghoo about that. Junghoo is my patient before he’s my cousin, so I have to maintain confidentiality.”

As Yoo Taeha indirectly expressed his difficult situation, Seowon didn’t ask further.

“So, about that, could you tell Junghoo to get hospitalized today? He listens to you well, doesn’t he?”

“He doesn’t listen to everything I say, either.”

Even Seowon couldn’t stop all of Junghoo’s antics. So he spoke skeptically, but Yoo Taeha’s trusting gaze caught his eye.

“Just try talking to him, and if Junghoo says he won’t be hospitalized, then it can’t be helped. Let’s go back. This punk is calling.”

How long has it been since we left, and he’s already calling? Yoo Taeha held up his phone, which was buzzing loudly, and showed him the screen. If Junghoo’s patience ran out, it was obvious that he would rip out even the IV that Seowon had told him to leave alone and storm out.

“Oh, by the way, if Junghoo watches you for 24 hours straight, report it.”

The number is 112. Yoo Taeha muttered, as if trying to shake off the serious atmosphere from just a moment ago.

If you’re going to joke, you could at least smile. It seemed to confirm just how bad Junghoo’s condition was, and Seowon’s heart grew heavy.

“…Hyung.”

Seowon hesitated for a moment, then called Yoo Taeha.

“It’s better for him to be hospitalized, right?”

“It is, isn’t it?”

The end of Yoo Taeha’s sentence, where he had said to hospitalize him, went up. It was because he was wondering about the meaning behind Seowon’s question.