Chapter 49: The Weight of Ownership

“Chief Eunuch Seok.”

“Your command, Your Highness.”

At Yeo Jae-won’s chilling tone, the old eunuch answered smoothly, as if he had never been flustered in the first place.

“Clear the area.”

“But, Your Highness…”

“Have all the attendants of both the inner and outer quarters leave the study immediately.”

Was he truly intending to lock him in and intimidate him? Chief Eunuch Seok’s straight gaze darted anxiously between the two masters. Yeo Jae-won glared sharply at the hesitant attendant, who finally bowed deeply and reluctantly retreated in absolute silence.

Anok held his head high, desperately pretending to be unaffected, but his gaze purposely avoided Yeo Jae-won, dropping slightly toward the floor. Unable to predict what would happen next, his fingertips grew ice-cold.

Yeo Jae-won walked slowly around the table that stood between them.

“Then…”

His voice flowed out with a quiet insinuation, far softer than the tone he had just used to dismiss the servants, yet it lacked his usual absolute lack of emotion. Anok tensed. The Yeo Jae-won of this lifecycle was not the man he once knew.

He was a completely unpredictable man. That was how Anok viewed the prince he faced now, and it was far too early to let down his guard.

Soon, Yeo Jae-won came to a halt directly in front of him. The massive shadow cast by the prince’s presence fell like a heavy veil over Anok’s pale face.

“For something like this…”

A large hand—the very hand the Anok of his past life had loved and yearned for so desperately—firmly clamped around his chin and neck. Anok’s entire body stiffened with pure tension.

Terrified of what the man might do, he closed his eyes tightly and gritted his teeth. Then, a slightly rough, dry sensation pressed against his lips.

It was a gnawing pressure, a mouth that seemed to crave something as it tried to force his lips apart. The sudden, intense heat of another person—possessing a body temperature so remarkably similar to his own—made Anok’s shoulders lock completely.

Beyond any words he could use to define the act, he felt a wave of profound embarrassment. Anok reached out to push the man away, but even that hand was instantly captured by Yeo Jae-won.

The prince’s fingers slipped between Anok’s, tangling their hands together like the cold, thick mud of a swamp that ensnares a person’s ankles, or like vines that desperately bind themselves to another plant.

As if demanding permission, Yeo Jae-won persistently bit at his lower lip, releasing it only to suck and soothe it repeatedly. Feeling the heat of a burning gaze, Anok slowly lifted the eyelids he had kept so tightly pressed together.

Possessiveness. Anok instantly recognized the cold, flame-like emotion lurking in the depths of the prince’s eyes.

It was not a tender, pitiful love or a pathetic pining; it was pure possessiveness. A surging anger at a piece of property that stubbornly refused to belong to him.

In the narrow gap where their eyes met, the prince’s tongue parted his lips, sliding inside with a wet, heavy sound. It stroked the very root of his tongue, then sucked gently as if it had never meant to startle him at all—a deeply unfamiliar, disorienting sensation.

The kiss was fierce and violent. Anok tried to wrench his captured hand free, but Yeo Jae-won, who had wrapped his other arm tightly around his waist, left absolutely no opening.

“……Is it only when we become a couple who can do things like this without a second thought that you will finally acknowledge me as your spouse?”

Even the final withdrawal was entirely at Yeo Jae-won’s whim.

It was a kiss that felt far more like a punishment meant to enforce submission than an act of desire. Anok glared at Yeo Jae-won, his eyelids trembling with a volatile mix of anger, shame, and sheer humiliation.

Instead of using his right hand, which Yeo Jae-won still held firmly in his grasp, he raised his left hand, his knuckles stark white from how tightly he clenched his fist. As if anticipating a strike, Yeo Jae-won tilted his head slightly, practically daring him to do it. But Anok did not strike.

As if forcing down his rage, his throat worked once as he swallowed hard, and he used his boldly raised hand to harshly scrub at his mouth, wiping away the messy traces of the kiss. It was an outright denial of what had just occurred.

“Your Highness said it yourself once. That there were such people.”

Anok spoke in a slightly subdued, quiet voice.

“Those who possess absolutely nothing in their hands, yet rush forward blindly, knowing they will only break themselves in the process.”

“……”

“Foolish and pitiful people.”

“Ha……”

“You are truly pitiful, Your Highness.”

How many times in his entire life had this powerful man ever heard words of sympathy, compassion, or pity directed to his face?

Anok had thrown back the exact words he had received from Yeo Jae-won on the very first day he had entered the Myeong estate at the start of this second lifecycle. Yet, he still felt entirely unsatisfied. He bit his lip, his entire frame trembling beneath his robes.

Staring down at him with half of his handsome face twisted into an unreadable expression, Yeo Jae-won curled his mouth. It was not a sneer directed at Anok; it felt closer to a mockery of himself.

“Pitiful……”

Repeating the word as if to taste it, Yeo Jae-won willingly released his grip on Anok’s waist. But his hand did not leave his body completely.

His large palm slid diagonally up Anok’s back, tracing over his upper arm until it reached the nape of his neck.

The only physical testament to the kiss was a slightly red, swollen lower lip. Nevertheless, Yeo Jae-won’s hand slid past his neck and easily cupped his chin. He parted Anok’s lower lip with his thumb, brushing against the delicate inner flesh in a manner that felt almost lewd.

Utterly unable to read his intentions, Anok pulled his head back to evade the touch. Just as before, Yeo Jae-won let him go without a struggle.

“Is what I hold in my hands truly so worthless to you?”

The words sounded like a quiet mutter to himself. If this had been before his rebirth, Anok would have immediately shaken his head at such a question.

Back then, Yeo Jae-won was the man who held absolutely everything that belonged to Anok. His heart, his body, his loyalty, his status—truly everything. But now, he had no desire to grant anything to the man standing before him. He had been bound to this stubborn, frustrating marriage against his will, but he refused to give a fraction more.

He had to maintain this distance with this man. If he granted him an inch, the prince would not hesitate to take a mile.

“I am your husband, and I am also your lord.”

“……”

“Does all of this mean so little to you?”

It was Yeo Jae-won himself who had made it so. He was the one who had rejected Anok in the past because he was an omegian. He was also the one who had only half-heartedly fulfilled a marriage forced upon them by others.

But suddenly, Anok found himself questioning if that was still the case with the current Yeo Jae-won. Compared to his previous life, the man standing before him felt like an entirely different person.

The Yeo Jae-won of this life—even if it was merely out of a passing, momentary interest—did not ignore or turn away from him. He easily offered the small kindnesses that the past version of himself had only rarely shown. If anything, it was Anok himself who was fiercely pushing him away in this lifecycle.

They say people possess many faces; could this simply be another side of Yeo Jae-won? If so, was this a path that had always been possible? Perhaps…… could they have been like this in their previous life as well?

The only variable that had truly changed between his past life and this one was Anok himself. If that were true, was his own failure to make this version of reality bloom in the past also his own fault? The familiar, habitual tendency toward self-blame once again coldly saturated Anok’s consciousness.

“But you are right. Rushing in will only break me.”

Yeo Jae-won spoke in a self-deprecating tone, taking half a step backward. Anok stared at him as the distance between them grew, his eyes wide as if he could not fully comprehend the prince’s words.

There was absolutely no way the man harbored genuine feelings for him. For an omegian, and a man at that, how could Yeo Jae-won possibly care for him? He must simply be mistaking his own possessiveness for something deeper, driven wild because Anok refused to bend to his will.

Nevertheless, Anok found it incredibly difficult to look away from those dark eyes, which for some inexplicable reason looked deeply hurt.

Even though the sudden, violent kiss had left him feeling utterly humiliated, those eyes looked heartbreakingly identical to the way his own reflection had looked over the past seven years. Knowing it was foolish, Anok still found himself chasing Yeo Jae-won’s gaze.

“Keep that item safe.”

“Your Highness, this servant—”

“As long as you address yourself as ‘this servant’ before me, it belongs to you, whether you desire it or not.”

Having delivered his final word, Yeo Jae-won stared down at Anok with his usual dry, unreadable black eyes. Then, he turned on his heel and left in an instant.

Listening to the sharp, receding footsteps fading down the corridor, Anok slumped heavily into his chair, every ounce of his strength entirely drained.

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