TRIPLE 24

‘You are welcome to live freely within the mansion, but it would be best if you did not entertain any useless thoughts otherwise.’

Even while frequently absent from the house, Beom Yisu had made his demands regarding the interior of the mansion perfectly clear. The surveillance cameras installed throughout the house, the staff who managed the interior, and even the external access logs. In short, it meant that he was under surveillance, so he shouldn’t even think about running away in vain.

Of course, he had thought about it briefly. But he had no intention of acting rashly while unprepared. Leaving the mansion had to happen only after securing the funds and a route necessary for escape. If he were lucky enough to get out now, he would surely only endure a world of suffering before being dragged back here.

‘I don’t even know if the Chief Kang issue has been completely resolved yet. It’s still too early.’

That he couldn’t easily escape this place was something he had expected from the start. I’ll just take my time and prepare. Once he changed his mindset like that, he adapted to the lifestyle of the mansion quite quickly.

First of all, for breakfast, one could just eat whatever was prepared as a self-service option. The problem was what filled the refrigerator.

For the first few days, he was appalled every time he opened the fridge.

Evian, unnamed sparkling water, unsweetened yogurt, protein shakes, and things like cheese the size of a palm. It looked less like a refrigerator for human living and more like a model home exhibition.

Eventually, Siyeon couldn’t stand it and wrote down the things he usually enjoyed drinking, like barley tea bags, or things he ate when he felt peckish—squid jerky, gummy worms, chocolate milk, and simple snacks—on a memo and left it on top of the fridge.

He had just wondered, but from the next day on, that refrigerator shelf began to be filled with those items. He didn’t know who was bringing them, but they even emptied out one shelf entirely for his exclusive use.

Since he had complete free time until lunch, Siyeon spent most of his time holed up in his room.

Reading books or putting on movies on the large monitor installed in the room. Of course, it was less because he truly wanted to watch movies and closer to spending time contemplating how he might survive here or how he could minimize the time he had to face the two alphas.

After passing the morning like that and eating lunch, the most ambiguous time of the day began. He didn’t feel like sitting still like a dog waiting for its owner to return. It was fortunate that Beom Yisu and Chae Yoonoh were away.

The employees working at the mansion treated Siyeon like he didn’t exist. Since they turned pale and avoided him as if they had seen a ghost whenever he spoke first, Siyeon chose to keep his mouth shut after a few attempts.

In that sense, ironically, what gave Siyeon some breathing room was the fact that this mansion, which at first only felt stifling, was absurdly large.

Thanks to the abundance of space to roam, the feeling of being trapped was minimized. Exercising while walking to rehabilitate his leg, where he had pulled a ligament, and digging around to see if there were any valuables he could use as emergency funds were quite rewarding. While he couldn’t hide anything too conspicuous due to the surveillance cameras, moving decorations that looked expensive into his room had been going smoothly.

Furthermore, ever since Chae Yoonoh left him his black card, strange items began to increase in Siyeon’s room.

Fluffy sleeping socks, a large cushion that fully reflected his personal taste, and even a neck pillow that was advertised as protecting one’s spine.

At first, he was wary of the employees bringing the delivery boxes, but after a few days, even that became dull. If he were going to be trapped here anyway, wasn’t it the better deal to live as comfortably as possible?

The problem was Chae Yoonoh’s card.

Once he started using it, the brakes didn’t work well. At first, he really only bought things he needed, but at some point, he was adding items to his cart that made him think, ‘Who on earth buys this?’

He really should stop goofing off and figure out an escape route.

…But spending money was just too fun.

Of course, he didn’t just laze around completely.

To move as he pleased inside this mansion, he needed to at least look like someone with something to do. It was obvious that if he walked around for no reason, the surveillance would only get stricter.

So, once, he had cautiously asked Beom Yisu if he could help with garden maintenance.

But that proposal was rejected immediately. Aside from the fact that there was already a separate staff member for the garden, the reason was, above all, that Siyeon might get hurt.

The job he was given instead was organizing the underground archives. Even though it was handed to him haphazardly, organizing the archives was the second-best option Siyeon had wanted after garden maintenance.

There were many reasons for this, but even stripping away the extra details, it first and foremost fit his aptitude perfectly. Hadn’t he been surrounded by countless books while working at a printing shop even before possessing this body? Perhaps for that reason, just belonging to that space made his heart feel at ease.

‘Why is it so magnificent?’

Chae Yoonoh and Beom Yisu both seemed too busy to even have time to read books, but the scale of the library was beyond imagination. He had guessed to some extent since there was a scene in the original work where the protagonist was surprised to see that space, but seeing it with his own eyes was far more impressive.

The bookshelves reached almost to the ceiling, and one had to climb a ladder to reach the upper shelves. It had only been a few days since he started, and Siyeon set a volume to organize only a few shelves a day.

He thought he might not be able to finish organizing it all by the time his contract period ended, but that pace actually made him feel more at ease.

After the afternoon passed without any particular incidents, evening arrived. During this time, it was a rule to dine with Beom Yisu, though of course, that rule wasn’t always kept. He mostly came home late, and there were even days when he didn’t show his face at all.

Still, on the days they sat across from each other, Beom Yisu would continue taking calls with his secretary even during the meal. Watching that, he felt a strange sensation. It felt like he was truly a busy person worthy of the ‘#Chaebol_Top’ keyword, yet he felt that Beom Yisu was going out of his way to come home nonetheless.

Of course, Siyeon had a rough guess as to the reason. It must be for the ‘pheromone partner’ work that would follow the meal. Despite being unnecessarily nervous at the word ‘partner,’ it was nothing more than sitting nearby drinking tea or exchanging pheromones while doing their own things.

On the exact day it had been a week since he had been living in the mansion alone with him, without Chae Yoonoh. For some reason today, a notification was sent to Siyeon to be prepared for Beom Yisu.

Surprised by the unusual notice, he replied for the first time, but there was no response. He had briefly debated whether to share this fact with Chae Yoonoh, but suppressed his anxiety as it seemed like it would only cause trouble.

However, despite his nervousness, the clock ticked toward late afternoon. He said he wouldn’t be late, but it was almost nearing midnight.

Click— Finally, it was only in the middle of the night that the front door opened. The friction sound of a coat being taken off and the sound of catching one’s breath.

It was Beom Yisu.

He crossed the living room with a pace that did not hurry. Then, he discovered the figure of Siyeon sitting in one corner of the dim living room and stopped in his tracks for a moment.

“Mr. Hong Siyeon.”

At the sound of him calling his name, Siyeon slowly lifted his head.

“…You’ve arrived?”

His voice was hazy, like that of someone who had just woken up. Although he had been contacted by Beom Yisu earlier in the day, he hadn’t been sitting in the living room waiting for him until night.

Perhaps because his pheromone system had become a mess, as the doctor said, after overdosing on un-heat suppressants, falling asleep at any time was one of the side effects. Because of that, he had just intended to close his eyes for a moment after dinner, and he had ended up just drifting off like that.

However, the sight of him messily raising his body in the middle of the unlit living room seemed to have a completely different meaning to him.

“Were you waiting for me?”

“You contacted me. Today… that you were going to do the… pheromone thing.”

Siyeon replied while rubbing his eyes roughly.

As he lifted his head, he saw Beom Yisu had already reached right in front of where he was sitting up.

“I left a message saying I would be late, but it seems you didn’t check it.”

He was the one who had nailed down that the pheromone partner task was important, yet he postponed the appointment according to his own convenience.

Does it mean that since the other party is trapped inside the mansion, it doesn’t matter if he acts according to his own comfort? Siyeon grumbled inwardly as he watched Beom Yisu take off his coat.

Suddenly, looking down at his wrist to check the time out of habit, the band he was wearing instead of a watch caught his eye.

‘…It turned orange.’

The thin sensor band that Chae Yoonoh had put on him right before leaving the country. He had said that if the heat precursors or changes in pheromone concentration exceeded a certain level, the notification would go to Chae Yoonoh first. Seeing that the light, which was usually yellow, had turned orange, it seemed like the levels were fluctuating again while he was asleep.

‘But… how am I supposed to go get my check-up?’

Although he had said he had told the hospital side in advance, wouldn’t he still have to go out to check his body’s condition? As the doctor’s words about needing a bi-weekly check-up surfaced, an irritation of a different texture than his previous annoyance rose to his throat.

Is there really no way to go out? Siyeon rubbed his stiff eyes once and opened his mouth.

“There was one thing I wanted to ask the CEO.”

Beom Yisu stopped the hand that was loosening his tie and looked at Siyeon.

“Go ahead.”

“When will it be possible for me to go outside the mansion?”