Chapter 53: First Strike

Was it simply because he was sharing a room with Choi Han-geon?
But such a flimsy reason couldn’t possibly explain this desire.
Just imagining sharing a room with some other man made bile rise in his throat.

Then the reason for this sticky, unpleasant feeling—

He didn’t know.
Eun-gyeol didn’t have the luxury to calmly analyze or measure things like that.
Filming went on late every night, Yoo Junseong was still skittering around, and Juwon—who knew Eun-gyeol’s cycle was drawing closer—had begun acting even more aggressively.
His head hurt in every possible way.

In the midst of all that, Choi Han-geon kept making “mistakes.”
Originally, there had been no limit to how much Eun-gyeol was willing to overlook and forgive those mistakes.
After all, the person most afraid of damaging their relationship was Choi Han-geon himself.
Even while constantly slipping up and revealing his heart, he had worked so hard to draw lines that it was painful to watch, which was why Eun-gyeol had felt no need to intervene.

But in the end, he crossed the very line he had drawn himself.

“…Like, someone with muscles… with a big build… have you ever done it with an omega like that?”

It was a foul.
A serious blunder.
That didn’t mean it was unforgivable—of course not.
No matter what anyone said, Choi Han-geon was his.

Still, he needed to put the brakes on.
So he gave him an answer that Han-geon would never want to hear.

“Just imagining it makes me feel f*cking sick.”

He spat the words while looking at Han-geon calmly.
He saw Han-geon’s eyes shatter at that.
Even his thick fingers trembled slightly.
With a face that looked composed, he suffered miserably.
With a blunt expression, without shedding a single tear, he wailed in silence.

Even so, it couldn’t be helped.
It was a kind of preventative shot.
If you don’t cut emotions off at the right time, they grow at a monstrous speed.
If you try to cut them later, once the leaves have thickened and the trunk has grown wide, the pain then won’t even compare to what you feel now.

No matter how fierce or unfamiliar the confusion, if he suppressed it in that moment, then looked back after time passed, it would turn out to be nothing.
He hoped that the unspeakably vile desire he felt toward Han-geon, and Han-geon’s mistake, would flow away like that too.
He could keep pretending not to know, just like before, forever.
Choi Han-geon had to remain by his side, without incident, eternally.

Looking back, that was his mistake.
His carelessness.
The situation had already been spiraling out of control where he couldn’t see it.
The price for his complacency came back carrying even greater confusion.

***

He woke up at dawn.
Reflexively, he checked the bed beside him.
It was because of a routine he had been secretly maintaining.

Now, even when Han-geon wasn’t awake, he would sometimes drench him in pheromones.
Then he’d slip back into sleep.
It felt good, and once it became a habit, he slept well afterward.

But damn it, the bed was empty.
He immediately guessed Han-geon had gone to work out.
Checking his phone confirmed it.

Looking at the diligently left message from his friend, he felt anxious and angry.
He didn’t know why.
It wasn’t like he’d gone far.
Before he realized it, he had pulled on workout clothes.
And when he went downstairs, what met his eyes was a truly infuriating morning sight.

Seeing him sweating together with Yoo Junseong made a hollow laugh slip out.
As if that weren’t enough, Yoo Junseong was even bringing up Eun-gyeol’s rut.
What he was trying to pull with Han-geon was obvious without even looking.

What drove him even crazier was Choi Han-geon turning pale and stepping in just because Yoo Junseong got cursed at a little.

“Please, please stop. Don’t fight. Eun-gyeol, come shower with me, okay?”

Please.
Choi Han-geon grabbed his shoulders and said “please.”
He was practically begging.
With a desperate face.

At that moment, something cracked with a sharp, splintering sound.
What the violent fissure caused was the collapse of his inner self.
Through the gap, desires from the past—crudely buried—came bursting out.

For the first time, Eun-gyeol wanted to see Han-geon crying and begging him.

He wondered what kind of expression he’d make if he shoved his cock into his mouth, grabbed his hair, and rammed it in relentlessly.
Would he shake his head weakly, face flushed red, tears streaming?
Even then, would he cry and say please, begging in that obscenely arousing way?

He didn’t know why the f*ck his d*ck was getting hard over something he’d never once been conscious of in his life.
What was boiling up without any room for doubt was sexual sadism.
Raw lust.

‘…Haha. No way. f*ck.’

He must have gone crazy from running into Yoo Junseong too often.
He tried to dismiss it as temporary.
Even after being dragged back by Han-geon’s pleading hands, he could only scoff in disbelief.
Sexual desire, my ass.
It had to be because he was right before his rut.

And yet—

Why was it that Juwon, who kept throwing himself at him as his rut approached, didn’t even register in his sight?
Why did Han-geon’s begging face keep filling his head, over and over again?
Why did the memory of that voice, coaxing him to shower together with an arm around his shoulders, keep resurfacing?

Why did he keep imagining splattering his fluids all over that face that blinked innocently, knowing nothing…?

Why, why, why—f*ck.

He swallowed the curse that threatened to spill out and clenched his fist.
For the first time, there was something he absolutely couldn’t let Han-geon see.
He wasn’t the only one who needed to be careful not to make a mistake anymore.
This feeling was unfamiliar, and f*cking awful.

That ominous sign finally exploded at dawn, when the symptoms before rut set in.
He even got suppressants from the chief manager in the early morning.
He’d brought them intending to take them, even though he normally never did, but his hands shook so badly he couldn’t even tear the package open.
He barely made it back to the room and flung the suppressants onto the bed.

His gaze was nailed to the faintly glowing face.
Looking at the defenseless sleeping face, the d*ck that had been standing like a madman now throbbed with pain.

In his mind, he was already stripping off the blanket covering Han-geon’s body and roughly spreading his legs.
Han-geon would probably mumble, asking what was wrong, looking up with sleep still clinging to his face.
Confused and flustered, he still wouldn’t be able to shove him away forcefully.

He imagined tearing all his clothes apart and spitting into his hole.
No foreplay—thrusting straight in and driving it all the way to the deepest point.
Pumping his hips like a dog in heat.

Stuffing his most intimate place until it overflowed with cum—
what kind of expression would Han-geon make then?

Would he widen his eyes in shock?
Cry that it hurt?
Call him a filthy bastard?
Or like a few days ago, would he beg—please—wearing that f*cking arousing face…?

“…Eun-gyeol?”

He nearly lost it.

Seeing him wake up and blink, a chill shot through his lower abdomen as if it were falling out.
Goosebumps raced down his spine and wrapped around his entire body.
The thrill that stabbed straight into his backbone when the imagined voice overlapped with the real one was something he’d probably never forget for the rest of his life.

“Be quiet.”

A hoarse voice came out.
In the darkness, the eyes looking down at him were probably glinting obscenely.

“Shut your mouth and stay still for a moment.”

If Choi Han-geon called his name even once more, he felt like he would actually act out that insane fantasy.
Grinding his teeth, he dragged out every shred of patience he had ever possessed.

He had to admit it.
That he was in heat for this guy.
It was absurd, but there was no way around it.
Even while looking at Han-geon’s face, his swollen cock wouldn’t go down.
It didn’t even subside while looking at the unmistakable outline of another man’s cock beneath his clothes…

f*ck.
Chewing on the curse, he shoved the suppressants Han-geon was holding into his mouth.
He had to fight desperately to suppress the urge to bite into his palm and wrist instead of swallowing the pills.
Only after stuffing himself to the limit with medication did his strength finally give out, and he collapsed onto the bed.

This rut was truly bizarre.
Had he poured too many pheromones onto Choi Han-geon?
Yeah—maybe that was why these inexplicable, unexplainable mood swings were happening.

After a short sleep.
After finishing today’s shoot.
After rolling around messily with an omega for a few days…

Once the heat was completely vented, his ruined body and mind would no longer remember the filthy desire it had aimed at his seventeen-year-long friend.
Just as he had overlooked Han-geon’s mistakes for years without any confusion, the mistake he’d made today—pinning him to the bed—would pass the same way.

And that was his second lapse in judgment.