Chapter 1: A Splendid Nutcase in the Mountains

Words have power.

The moment they are sparked from the mouth, they flare up toward the opponent like a flame.

“You, come out here right now.”

However, at this moment, Yunhwan overlooked a crucial fact.

For his words to hold the binding force necessary to restrain the opponent, the man had to be sane—which he currently was not.

In the mountains, the air was thick with damp moss and the muggy heat of a tropical night.

Between the crevices of rocks, bizarrely weathered by nature, a pair of sharp, blue eyes flashed.

The man’s murderous presence, which overwhelmed the senses, felt particularly unrealistic today, making Yunhwan even more cautious.

“I told you to get out here, now.”

Yunhwan frowned.

Ever since he started living with that human, Yunhwan had always been in the position of a hunter.

Like now, he had to pressure the opponent with words and watch for the right moment to capture them.

Thick veins popped out on his neck as he faced his target.

“Min Seonghye!”

It was then.

Before he could even spit out another solemn warning to come out immediately, a sound tickled his ears.

Yunhwan perked up his ears, following the clear melody, and soon his face contorted.

The source was the man’s humming, based on a children’s nursery rhyme.

—Nari, nari, forsythia. Picking it and holding it in your mouth.

“…….”

—A brood of chicks, hop, hop, hop. Going on a spring outing.

Yunhwan’s pupils shook slightly at the familiar tune.

To hear such a gloomy and creepy humming deep in the mountains where not even a water deer would cry.

‘Crazy b*stard….’

I’m drenched in sweat from running halfway up the mountain in the middle of the night.

Yunhwan tightened his grip on both hands hidden behind his back.

His hands were wrapped in agricultural twine like bandages, and its purpose was simple.

To capture the man alive.

Just as Yunhwan was about to take a step onto the damp, moisture-laden leaves.

“Hey.”

The man’s white, smooth face revealed itself through a gap between the high, large rocks.

He was a presence that made one’s nerves stand on end with just a single glance.

As the man’s toes lightly stepped over the darkness, his shadow stretched out and rose tall.

At the same time, the man stood in a position perfectly facing Yunhwan.

“Are you really going to do it?”

“…You.”

However, what flustered Yunhwan wasn’t the man’s whisper, nor the creepy and eerie atmosphere he created.

‘Why is that….’

Why was the axe he had shoved away in the warehouse held in that human’s hand?

The sight of the axe blade flashing with an ominous energy made the hair on the back of Yunhwan’s neck stand up.

The axe, bought for the occasional wood-chopping and then forgotten in the warehouse, shouldn’t have had such a sharp edge.

Since purchasing the axe, Yunhwan had never sharpened the blade once.

Seeing Yunhwan’s flustered reaction, the man sneered mockingly.

“I sharpened it. While you were sleeping.”

“…….”

“I had a bit of a hard time doing it secretly.”

At that low murmur, Yunhwan’s foot lost its strength and stepped on a branch.

Crackle. Seeing the broken branch, Yunhwan briefly had the useless thought that he had somehow fallen into the man’s trap.

It made sense.

The man before him had a colorful track record.

He had escaped by smashing a door right in front of Yunhwan, jumped into a river one day, and today, he was playing tag in the middle of the night.

Was it because he had loosened the man’s shackles too much?

Every time this happened, Yunhwan had to bite his lip hard to suppress the surging regret.

The twine was pulled taut between his two hidden hands.

“Put that a, axe down.”

Looking at the man holding the chillingly sharpened axe, Yunhwan had already finished all his calculations.

“Are you planning to catch a wild boar on your way? Or do you want to catch a person? Whatever it is, if you carry that around, you might end up incarcerated in Cheongsong Prison.”

How was he supposed to stop a guy who intended to go all the way up to Seoul on foot in this day and age?

To make matters worse, he was now even possessing a lethal weapon.

“So throw that away and come here.”

Nevertheless, he had to stop him by any means necessary.

He had to take responsibility and keep the man stuck here.

Only then would everyone be safe.

“Min Seonghye, hurry up.”

Yunhwan urged once more in a low-pitched voice.

He couldn’t even remember how many times he had repeated those words, but each time he had done his best to persuade the man, and now was no different.

While the man with the axe was shining with an eerily bright gaze, Yunhwan’s eyes, as he tried to persuade him from the opposite side, regained their composure.

“Seonghye. I said, come here.”

Min Seonghye.

This invasive species, who had suddenly appeared and settled here in Sanghui-ri, had been relentlessly destroying and disturbing the ecosystem ever since.

And as if that wasn’t enough.

“F*ck, Yunhwan.”

“…….”

“Throw away the string you’re hiding behind your back before you speak.”

He was also testing Yunhwan’s patience every single day.

A lit fuse triggers a bomb in the blink of an eye.

The confrontation between the two men was exactly like that.

Yunhwan slowly spoke, never taking his eyes off Seonghye’s hand holding the axe.

“It’s already been a week. Since you and I started living together. But how can you not let a single day pass quietly!”

It had already been a week since their secret cohabitation began.

A week ago, after taking over Min Seonghye from Manager Park here in Sanghui-ri, Yunhwan’s daily life began to shake helplessly.

Before he could even play along with the plausible excuse that he was being sent down for recuperation, Min Seonghye, who woke up on a cheap wooden bed on the first day of their cohabitation, spoke chillingly.

‘By any chance, was I sold? To an Omega?’

Yunhwan hadn’t bought Seonghye, and he was certainly not an Omega, but he didn’t bother to refute it.

He could have explained that Seonghye hadn’t been sold but was instead entrusted to him, but the words wouldn’t come out easily.

He was just slightly surprised that the first thing a man, who had been fallen into a deep sleep looking as if all his energy was drained, said upon waking up was something like that.

Moreover, the moment he scanned the surroundings, his gaze turned cold.

When Yunhwan even lost the will to introduce himself under that sharp gaze directed at him.

A voice, which has now become familiar, flowed out quite gently.

‘Haha, just kidding, just kidding. The first thing I see when I open my eyes is your face, and what’s draped over me is this piece of rag. It’s just funny.’

Thinking back now, Min Seonghye’s way of speaking then and now lacked even a single grain of character or refinement.

Instead of raising his voice to argue, he mocked his suddenly changed, humble environment with that characteristically heavy and composed voice.

‘Wow, I guess this is like a modern-day thatched cottage. It’s not like mice fall from the ceiling and centipedes come out of the walls, right? Or waking up to find a snake crawling over my body.’

‘…M, Mr. Min Seonghye.’

‘You’ve already memorized my name? Just how hard are you planning to work?’

It was a tone that lacked even a shred of politeness, but at the time, Yunhwan fully understood Seonghye’s state.

What had Manager Park said when he requested this job?

He said the person involved was very reluctant to come here, and since they probably had to use forced methods to bring him, his sense of rebellion would be strong.

However, as soon as he heard that distrustful tone—which couldn’t even be called a first greeting—Yunhwan intuitively felt that Seonghye was by no means an easy person.

And this prediction was not wrong.

Yunhwan’s resolve to take good care of Seonghye as requested by Manager Park was bound to collapse like a sandcastle several times a day.

Like a returning salmon, Yunhwan was exhausted several times a day by Min Seonghye’s strong will and actions to return to his original place.

Preventing an opponent who attempted to escape every single night was no easy task.

And so, a week passed.

After a week, what remained for Yunhwan was a daily life that had lost its center and a succession of days like an unending war.

Yunhwan raised his voice from where he stood.

“Why are you trying to go to Seoul? Hey, you came down here to recuperate. Then just take a good rest in a place with good air and good water!”

His heart beat heavily and fast like a racing marathoner.

“Why?”

Seonghye, who was standing leaning his shoulder against a rock, twisted his red, plump lips and spoke.

“Yunhwan, you need to snap out of it. Is this recuperating? It’s being confined, isn’t it?”

“…….”

“Your expression is quite a sight. Are you finally realizing what you’ve done?”

Seonghye shook his head as if he found it pathetic.

“This is why people need to mingle where people live…. Right, the way you live is so dingy and boring. That’s why you’ve lost your mind and can’t even distinguish if this is cohabitation or confinement.”

“I get it, so just come down for now—”

“Yunhwan, how much did you get from Manager Park for keeping me?”

As if representing his sensitive nature, Seonghye, who cut off Yunhwan’s right to speak in an instant, furrowed his brows.

“I heard you have to pay for your grandmother’s hospital bills with that. Hey… that’s a shame, it would’ve been better if it were honorable money. For earning the price of your only remaining blood relative’s life, the method is quite cr*ppy, our Yunhwan.”

“…….”

“You’re finally quiet now.”

His eyes curved into a soft line.

Unlike the elegant curve of his eyes, the pupils hidden within were sunk coldly.

Even as Yunhwan was pierced by the thorns spat out with his words and his lost gaze wavered like a buoy, Seonghye didn’t seem particularly concerned.

Rather, he looked like a person contemplating how much more he should stab to make him bleed.

“Still, it’s been fun in the meantime. Playing tag with me in this great scenery. You seemed to really like it every time you caught me.”

From Seonghye, who stood with his back to the moonlight, an overwhelming sense of intimidation could still be felt.

Yunhwan couldn’t even refute Seonghye’s words and just foolishly moved his lips.

Yunhwan slowly traced back the memory of the reason he met Seonghye, the starting point of all these moments.