* * *
Suhyeon blinked. His light-brown eyes subtly shimmered in the sunlight.
There was a strange man, frozen stiff and looking at him, but he hardly registered in Suhyeon’s sight.
Only the blue-eyed man, who was looking at him with his lips tightly sealed, was visible.
Hajin, whom Suhyeon hadn’t seen for days, was slightly frowning, his expression suggesting he was somehow displeased.
His handsome face, which was close to a work of art, was softly furrowed as he looked somewhere else in the mansion, before meeting Suhyeon’s eyes.
The man’s wrinkled face smoothed out gently. It seemed to be a change even he didn’t realize.
His bright blue eyes, as always, smoothly captured Suhyeon’s gaze.
‘Was there ever a person like this besides Do Yejun?’
Suhyeon thought blankly, then flinched and shook his head.
He didn’t want to think of Do Yejun anymore.
He didn’t want to compare Do Yejun with Hajin, either.
Hajin was the one who saved Suhyeon from the disaster that Do Yejun had pushed him into.
He should compare people who are worthy of comparison.
But, yes. That sensation, though.
—Are you an Enthrallment Esper, by any chance? Or another Mental-type Esper?
Suhyeon unconsciously recalled what Yihan had asked him on the first day he arrived here.
That absurd question of whether he was an Enthrallment Esper.
‘Shouldn’t he be asking that of Hajin instead?’
That was how much Suhyeon was drawn to Hajin.
Suhyeon clearly realized that fact at this moment.
The vague, entranced feeling that had continued since their first meeting was now interpreted and settled.
It felt a bit ridiculous to feel such an emotion when his body was so weakened—beyond words—from the aftermath of the disastrous breakup with Do Yejun and being sucked into the Gate, but Suhyeon raised his head.
Hajin still stood silently, not saying a word.
The blue eyes, holding Suhyeon in their sight, wavered.
Although he couldn’t exactly read what that gaze meant, Suhyeon definitely did not want Hajin to leave again.
The person who had appeared with Hajin must be a Teleportation Esper, given how quickly they arrived.
Suhyeon took one step, then two steps forward before Hajin could move away again.
As he got closer and looked up at him, Hajin also stared intently down at him.
“Do you have to go again?”
“…Suhyeon,”
As if he had been waiting for Suhyeon to speak, Suhyeon’s name flowed from Hajin’s lips with a deep, muffled sound.
Suhyeon tilted his head.
Hajin let out a deep sigh and pressed a firm hand onto his own forehead.
Because this was an action Hajin often performed when he was displeased, Esper Lee Jeonghyeon, who was cornered, gasped, but Suhyeon was unaware of that.
No, to Suhyeon’s eyes, it looked more like Hajin was at a loss for what to do.
It was an interpretation that others who knew Hajin couldn’t have imagined, but Suhyeon often saw something close to the truth when it came to Hajin.
What others saw as suffocating tension, Suhyeon and Hajin felt as an awkward, embarrassing, strange, and subtle tension.
After pressing his forehead for a long time, Hajin finally smoothed out his expression and looked at Suhyeon again.
The blue eyes wavered one more time.
Hajin stretched out his arm toward Suhyeon.
He had taken off the glove he was wearing at some point, and it was held in his other hand.
His arm trembled slightly, as if the action was involuntary, but he didn’t pull it back down.
This was the hand that had violently entangled with his fingers a few days ago, but now, the tips of his fingers merely brushed Suhyeon’s cheek, all of that audacious movement nowhere to be seen.
Suhyeon didn’t even feel the weight pressing on his pale cheek.
And Suhyeon did not refuse him.
As he stroked his pale cheek, Hajin looked at Suhyeon with a subtle expression.
Suhyeon also looked up at him without a word.
“Suhyeon.”
His name was called again.
Suhyeon met the blue eyes directly.
‘Huu,’ Hajin sighed heavily again and hesitated, as if he wanted to say something but couldn’t easily bring himself to speak.
Suhyeon blinked.
He didn’t have much dating experience either.
To be precise, his relationship with Do Yejun was the only one, but he certainly had an intuition.
It was embarrassing to say it himself, but quite a few people had approached Suhyeon during his school days and his time at the company, throughout his short twenty-three years of life.
He just had a calm and indifferent nature, and he was not the kind of person to accept advances if he wasn’t attracted to them, so he always put up a wall.
It didn’t seem like Hajin was harboring a different emotion than his own.
In the first place, if it wasn’t for such feelings, wouldn’t the tongue-lashing they shared the other night have been wrong?
Although they didn’t know each other well yet, Suhyeon was pleased and alright with this emotion that had spontaneously arisen.
Selfishly, he wouldn’t have to think about Do Yejun anymore, and since they weren’t children, shouldn’t they not have to awkwardly wait if feelings had developed?
The mood was set, and he had already made a confession before.
Just as Suhyeon was choosing his words, Hajin moved.
He used one hand to grab his own neck and looked down.
The man with the flawless, unshakable appearance avoided Suhyeon’s gaze and looked down.
And then, after another long moment.
“…Would you date me?”
“…Ah,”
It was clearly the confession he was about to make, and it shouldn’t be that awkward, but Suhyeon let out a shallow gasp involuntarily.
‘Thump,’ his heart pounded.
He felt heat rising to his face.
A confession from someone he was attracted to was quite, very nice.
“…Hough,”
Just as Suhyeon was about to nod, the soft, warm air that existed only between him and Hajin was shattered by a rough gasp.
Suhyeon unconsciously blinked and turned his head toward the source of the sound.
There was the Teleportation Esper, huddled in the corner, who had turned utterly pale, having watched the entire conversation between Suhyeon and Hajin.
‘Ah, that person was here.’
It was a little embarrassing.
But shouldn’t he not have a face like he just saw a ghost?
Suhyeon thought nothing of it and tried to turn his head back to Hajin.
“Hey…?”
But that wasn’t the end of it.
Suhyeon turned his head.
Yihan was standing on the stairs leading from the second floor to the first.
The doctor, wearing a white gown with messy hair as if he had just woken up, had his mouth wide open, staring at the scene.
Yihan looked at Hajin with a deathly pale face.
Then he looked at Suhyeon again.
He looked at Hajin again.
And then Suhyeon again.
Yihan, who alternated his gaze between the two of them, rushed toward Suhyeon like a maniac.
—OH!!!!
It felt somewhat like a déjà vu of their first meeting, but somehow the momentum was fiercer.
“S-Suhyeon.”
Yihan, having reached them, grabbed Suhyeon’s shoulders tightly and struggled for breath.
Yihan’s face, seen up close, was now so pale that it looked purple.
He seemed to have forgotten they had agreed to speak casually, reverting to the formal title.
“No, this isn’t right. Suhyeon, I, I really like you, you know? Separately from the Gate thing, I thought you were a very quiet, kind, and decent person, you know? I even thought it was amazing how you managed to shut that Shin Hajin bastard up, you know? But this is NOT right. Suhyeon, huh? This isn’t right.”
And Suhyeon was shaken like a paper doll, held by his shoulders, by the barrage of words.
“…Ryu Yihan.”
Hajin, who had been standing blankly beside them, seemed to come to his senses and kicked Yihan without hesitation.
THWACK!!!
“Agh!!!”
With the now-familiar sound of impact and a scream, Yihan tumbled onto the floor.
However, Yihan bounced back up immediately, as if possessed by a tumbler toy.
“Huh? Suhyeon, this isn’t right. I really don’t think this is right. First of all, how much that bastard plays innocent in front of you—Agh!!!!!”
A loud scream, the loudest Yihan had let out so far, echoed from the rambling doctor’s mouth.
BOOM!!!!!! BANG! BANG!!!!
The problem was that this chaos did not stop there.
This time, a tremendous roar from outside struck Suhyeon’s ears.
At that moment, Hajin, who had been taking his frustration out on Yihan, swiftly shielded Suhyeon at an incredible speed.
CRASH—!!
The enormous, floor-to-ceiling windows of the sunlit first floor all shattered into pieces.
Shards of glass flew through the air.
When Suhyeon, who had instinctively closed his eyes and flinched, opened them when nothing happened, he saw a blue shield, which he had seen once before, bloom around Hajin, enveloping Suhyeon.
The light shield quickly disappeared, perhaps having been used to block the glass shards.
Suhyeon, who was unconsciously following the trace of blue light, raised his head at the sound of crunchy glass shards being stepped on.
Two men in suits were standing there.
One was an unfamiliar face, but the other was someone all too familiar.
The man’s brown eyes, slightly darker than Suhyeon’s, glared fiercely at Hajin, then landed on Suhyeon beside him, and shook violently.
“Suhyeon…?”
Ryu Yihan, Suhyeon’s older brother and only family member.
The chaos finally reached a lull.
‘No, could you even call this a lull?’
* * *
