Chapter 37: The Ghost of Hong Kong

Haha. A small, airy laugh drifted through the air. At the sound of that refreshing laughter, Yunhwan looked up. Even though the cage was shrouded in fabric, the man inside drew his attention in every possible way.

His manner of speaking was elusive, and his voice sounded thick with secrets. His sentences required long contemplation to decipher. What kind of hobbies does a man like this have? Meditation? Philosophy? Whatever it was, Yunhwan didn’t think it involved anything active.

“I hope you fail,” the man said.

Yunhwan returned his gaze to the front. With a sigh, he gave his professional reply.

“I will make sure to save you.”

Four hours later. When his teammates stormed the warehouse, cutting through the thick darkness, it was Yunhwan who personally ripped away the shroud covering the man’s cage.

The man was a beauty of noble proportions.

His milky, translucent skin remained unblemished by the heat. His refined features were so striking they were almost unsettling. When their eyes met—Yunhwan looking past the man’s high bridge to his thin, double-lidded eyes—the expressionless man actually smiled.

Ridiculous. Finding that playful face strangely annoying, Yunhwan offered a blunt greeting.

“Congratulations. You get to live another day.”

Ah-haha. The man laughed joyfully and tilted his head. With a slender, eye-crinkling smile, he bit his lip lightly before issuing a command that sounded like a request.

“Come here.”

The sun had long since vanished, leaving the world in pitch black. At night, the man’s tone shifted significantly, turning into a slithering, syrupy voice that reached out for Yunhwan like a snake.

Yunhwan hesitated for a moment before answering.

“I’d rather not.”

Despite the bold rejection, a hand shot through the iron bars and grabbed Yunhwan by the collar. Team Leader Hong, who had followed him in, said something about the situation, but Yunhwan couldn’t hear the details. The man had pulled him in so close that he was whispering in a small, damp voice meant only for Yunhwan’s ears.

“You should have tried this in the morning, not a night like this… when the sun was up. That would have been quite a sight.”

“…I wasn’t assigned a specific time for the rescue.”

“Is that so?”

The man’s lips twitched into a smirk. It should have felt mean-spirited, but strangely, it didn’t. Perhaps it was the power of that handsome face. He looked like someone who had been raised in luxury, without a single scar on his face—so why was he so clearly tired of living?

Yunhwan’s train of thought was interrupted by the man’s sweet, low voice.

“Let’s meet at night from now on.”

The hand gripping his collar was quite large. Up close, the man looked like he easily cleared 190cm. Understanding why he had been yanked so effortlessly, Yunhwan just gave a half-hearted nod instead of an answer.

After that, they ran into each other frequently.

Having successfully completed the mission, Yunhwan and his colleagues received a week-long reward vacation. Rumor had it the client added a 500-million-won bonus on top of the 2.5 billion won success fee. For some reason, the high-priced target chose to stay in Hong Kong rather than return to Korea.

“Excuse me, sir.”

They were in the lobby of a hotel famous for its beautiful indoor fountain. A small espresso cup was placed down in front of the shaved ice Yunhwan had ordered.

“You and I have been crossing paths quite a bit lately. It’s also surprising to see you’re still alive.”

Yunhwan had been trying to ignore the man’s persistent staring, but he hadn’t expected him to brazenly take the seat directly across from him. Yunhwan stabbed his spoon into his shaved ice and looked up. Their gazes locked in mid-air. The man spoke slowly.

“Are you disappointed I’m not dead?”

“Hardly. From the moment you reacted to my voice, I figured you wouldn’t go easily.”

The sentence was playful, but Yunhwan’s voice was serious. If the man had truly wanted to die, he wouldn’t have responded. Just as Yunhwan took a bite of his dessert, the man’s lips curled upward.

“I was thinking of looking for a burial plot soon, actually.”

From his rolled-up white shirt sleeves to the slacks draped over his long legs—his dapper appearance naturally drew the eyes of everyone in the lobby. Being with someone who attracted so much attention was exhausting. Beneath his stifling “fake skin” mask, Yunhwan let out a deep sigh.

“…And what about that 2 billion with the ‘complicated collection method’?”

The man’s eyes crinkled at Yunhwan’s pointed murmur. A hint of amusement flickered in his black pupils. Yunhwan asked with a blank expression, “You’re not doing this on purpose because I saved you when you didn’t want to be saved, are you?”

“Well, not particularly.”

At the clear answer, Yunhwan nodded.

“Then I’ll be going. Enjoy your coffee.”

Yunhwan lost interest in the shaved ice he’d barely tasted. Yesterday at a restaurant, the day before at a mall while buying a souvenir for his grandmother… this was the third time.

As he felt a deep pang of regret for ever taking the job, the man’s long gaze followed Yunhwan’s retreating back.

“Wait.”

Grab. A hand caught his wrist, and Yunhwan reflexively twisted his arm away. The man frowned, looking back and forth between his empty hand and Yunhwan.

“Do you dislike being touched by people?”

The man’s sharp gaze pierced Yunhwan’s light brown eyes. Yunhwan rubbed his chin and muttered, “You’ll startle me if you grab me like that.”

“What is your name?”

What kind of question is that? Yunhwan’s eyebrows shot up. “What kind of mercenary goes around giving out their name?”

“Is that so? I’m not familiar with the etiquette of your kind.”

He’s getting bolder.

Yunhwan tilted his head. “Can I go now?”

“Aren’t you bored spending your vacation alone?”

The man’s gaze was obsessive, as if trying to find the “real” person hidden behind the mask. It was heavy and persistent.

The man broke the silence by slowly standing up. As Yunhwan had sensed, the height difference became apparent. Feeling burdened, Yunhwan took half a step back, but the man slowly closed the distance.

“I am Min Seonghye.”

The man who introduced himself as Min Seonghye looked down into Yunhwan’s eyes as he spoke.

He had been wearing his “fake skin” mask back then, so Seonghye shouldn’t have seen his face. He might know about the burn, but he had never shown him his face.

“Did you think I wouldn’t find you if you hid like this?”

Seonghye, who was flooding the room with his pheromones, whispered softly. “I told you. I was looking for you.”

His voice, boiling with heat, was more than Yunhwan could handle. He didn’t know how Seonghye had discovered their connection from three years ago, but Yunhwan had no desire to dig up that past.

Yunhwan managed to twist his body and slip out of the embrace.

The important thing was that their connection had ended in Hong Kong. Even though he had ended up looking after Seonghye due to Manager Park, Yunhwan knew he never would have taken the job if he had known the target was this man.

Even if Seonghye had been injured trying to save him… even if he had lost his memory and entered into an unwanted imprint…

As his thoughts reached that point, a wave of pity for the man washed over him.

“First, let’s go to the hospital, Seonghye-ya. Since your memory is back, you need an exam.”

“I guess you’ve decided to play dumb. I was a fool and didn’t realize you were right in front of me, but that ‘other guy’ who lost his memory found out through his own digging.”

Yunhwan’s heart raced, the thumping echoing from his toes to the crown of his head. He tried to steady his trembling breath.

“Go where? Why? Why should I go to a hospital with you?”

“Because your memory is back…!”

Yunhwan was desperate, but the man himself remained tepid.

“Yeah, it’s back. It’s definitely back…” Seonghye moistened his dry lips with his tongue. “And that exam you’re talking about is a pheromone check, right?”

“…If you don’t like that, we can just check if your physical body is okay.”

Seonghye arched an eyebrow and replied indifferently, “You’ve gained a lot of useless worries since I last saw you, Yunhwan-ah.”

“…….”

“Who are you actually worried about? Is it really me?”

Seonghye stared at Yunhwan and slowly pulled his lips into a smile. That face, usually so elegant, began to radiate a poisonous scent of anger and long-warped jealousy. Yunhwan could understand the anger toward himself, but he couldn’t fathom why the man was jealous of his own amnesiac self.

“Why… why…?”

Just as he opened his mouth to try and read that chaotic mind, one of the gazes locked in the air snapped and jerked away.

“…!”

A drop of cold sweat rolled down Seonghye’s eyelid.