VDN Ch 48

Nam-woon, shocked quickly lowered his head and hurried towards the back door. As soon as he was outside, he ran down the empty hallway as if running away. Then, someone grabbed his wrist from behind.

“……!”

“So you really do know each other, huh?”

Thinking it was Kwon Seo-oh, Nam-woon turned around in surprise, but fortunately or unfortunately, it was Jin-sang.

“We don’t know each other.”

Nam-woon replied shortly and tried to walk away again, but when he saw the men coming from the opposite direction, he quickly ducked his head.

“That delivery guy does know Kwon Seo-oh?”

“Kwon Seo-oh, that bastard, is really unlucky.” 

“Na Dae-yeol, did you do something weird? Why would a good-looking guy like that say such things?”

The man called Na Dae-yeol was the one Nam-woon had met before, when he first came to pick up Seo-oh at Korea University while doing deliveries. Back then, Nam-woon had looked him in the eye and started rambling nonsense about corneas and eyesight, pretending to be involved in organ trafficking.

It was truly a minefield everywhere.

They hadn’t noticed Nam-woon yet. Quickly, Nam-woon slipped into the nearest bathroom, with Jin-sang following him like a leech. About ten seconds later, Na Dae-yeol’s loud voice rang out right in front of the bathroom.

“Huh? Hey! Kwon Seo-oh!”

As soon as Nam-woon heard that, he squeezed himself into a bathroom stall. Jin-sang tried to follow him in, so Nam-woon hissed in a low voice,

“Hey, why are you coming in here!”

“Then what am I supposed to do out here by myself?”

Jin-sang looked at him with wide, innocent eyes. Seeing those clear, brown, glass-like eyes, Nam-woon let him into the stall. This guy’s such a nutcase, it’s dangerous to leave him alone.

“Did you see a guy come this way?”

It was Seo-oh’s voice.

“Hey, do you know that delivery guy?”

“I asked if you saw a guy come this way.”

“Oh, come on, there are tons of guys here! Are you talking about the guy with the pink helmet? That delivery guy!”

Nam-woon’s face twisted in frustration. Ugh, why did that cornea guy have to mention the delivery job?

At Na Dae-yeol’s words, Kwon Seo-oh spoke in a low voice.

“Delivery, huh…”

“Hey, you know who I’m talking about, right? Hey, is he really a gangster?”

Seo-oh acted like it wasn’t even worth answering and tried to leave. Na Dae-yeol shouted, “Where are you going!” and grabbed him, continuing,

“He’s a gangster, right? He must be, damn it. That’s why he said he’d take my eyeballs.”

“Eyeballs…?”

“Yeah! He’s crazy, I’m telling you! I heard him call someone named Jang-mi or Tulip or whatever and talk about organ trafficking!”

Nam-woon was in trouble. Kwon Seo-oh had told him not to bother the school kids. Frowning, Nam-woon brought his face close to the bathroom door. He could hear the conversation well enough, but he instinctively wanted to catch even the smallest reaction from Seo-oh.

But suddenly, both his cheeks were grabbed. Jin-sang, grabbing Nam-woon’s cheeks with long fingers, brought his face to Nam-woon’s face with an expressionless face.

Outside, Seo-oh still said nothing. Na Dae-yeol, getting more worked up, shouted,

“That’s what happens when you hang out with gangster punks like that, that’s why you have no respect for anyone—”

“He’s not a gangster.”

“What?”

“That guy’s not a gangster.”

Seo-oh added in a low voice.

“No matter how dumb he is, he’d never do something like take someone’s eyeballs.”

Nam-woon’s lips parted slightly upon hearing Seo-oh’s words. Na Dae-yeol scoffed at Seo-oh for a while before speaking.

“How do you know that? are you best friends with a gangster? What, are you fucking close?” 

“We are close.”

Kwon Seo-oh immediately answered without hesitation. Nam-woon’s eyes widened. He had never said they were close before. Even when Se-han had asked, Kwon Seo-oh had firmly answered that they weren’t. But now, in his absence, he said that. Even though answering that he was close to a gangster could cause trouble within the school. Really. 

“This is seriously messed up. But why have you been talking down to me and using informal language? Am I your friend?”

“Unbelievable. And why have you been talking shit and using casual language since earlier? Am I your friend?”

“Are you Hyung’s friend?”

“What…?”

“Don’t use casual language on Hyung.” 

Thud!

After Seo-oh’s quiet warning, there was a small noise, and Na Dae-yeol screamed.

Are they fighting out there?

As Nam-woon grabbed the door handle, a large white hand covered his. He turned to see Jin-sang mouthing, “Are you going out?” Nam-woon calmed down a bit. If he went out now, Jin-sang would go with him, and that would be an even bigger problem.

“Hey, Kwon Seo-oh! What’s wrong with you all of a sudden?”

Another guy tried to pull Seo-oh off Na Dae-yeol, who was still squawking.

“Damn, you’re so weird! Do you like that gangster or something?”

 Kwon Seo-oh remained silent.

“What, why isn’t this bastard answering? Do you really like him?” 

“…….”

Kwon Seo-oh still had no answer. Nam-woon, forgetting to even breathe, listened to the sounds outside. Jin-sang quietly scanned Nam-woon’s face as if observing him. Dae-yeol’s friend muttered in a flustered voice.

“What, I was going to ask you for that Hyung’s number….”

“No.”

Seo-oh, answering decisively, let go of Dae-yeol’s neck and headed for the door but stopped in his tracks

“That Hyung is a good person.”

Nam-woon’s grip on the bathroom door tightened. Seo-oh’s voice continued,

“So don’t go around saying weird stuff about him.”

Step, step—the sound of calm footsteps faded away. Then came Na Dae-yeol’s endless cursing and his friend asking if he was okay. After a while, they left, and silence returned to the once noisy bathroom.

Nam-woon lowered his eyes, lost in thought. Why does Seo-oh defend me like that? Especially when I’m not even there. It would be easier to just say he doesn’t know me.

“Nam-woon.”

He hadn’t really done anything for Seo-oh. At first, he’d only stuck around because the system forced him to.

“Nam-woon.”

Seo-oh gave him words and things he’d never heard or received in his life. Why? He was just a nobody, a loan shark. It felt so strange.

“Nam-woon.”

“What?”

Jin-sang had been calling his name over and over. The bathroom was already cramped, but he kept leaning closer to Nam-woon. Then he buried his face in Nam-woon’s neck and started sniffing, looking like a total pervert, and Nam-woon got goosebumps on his arm.

What the hell is wrong with this guy? Nam-woon struggled to push Jin-sang away. But then, Jin-sang said something that almost made him faint.

“I think I’m getting a little hard.”

Nam-woon quickly looked down at Jin-sang’s crotch. One of his thighs was wedged perfectly between Jin-sang’s legs. How did that happen? He must have gotten into a weird position when he pulled Jin-sang into the stall. He quickly pulled his leg away, but then Jin-sang dropped another bomb.

“I don’t usually get this hard. I think I’m going into rut.”

“What?”

Nam-woon felt dizzy. He immediately backed away and grabbed the door handle, but Jin-sang grabbed him.

“Lend me a hand.”

“Are you crazy?”

“It’s just another errand.”

Nam-woon then thought of the solutions 1, 2, and 3 that the system had once proposed.

“I’ll go buy you a suppressant. Give me money.”

“Why bother? Just use your hand…”

Unable to hold back, Nam-woon grabbed Jin-sang by the shoulders and shoved him against the bathroom wall. Startled by the sudden action, Jin-sang stared at Nam-woon with wide eyes.

“I’m your personal delivery guy, right? I’ll go buy it.”

With that, he flung open the bathroom door and hurried out. Jin-sang watched Nam-woon’s retreating back, then slowly pushed himself off the bathroom wall.

“Damn, this bathroom is filthy.”

But still, he has to endure it. Because it’s Nam-woon.

Hae-geon recalled a man whose face and name he couldn’t remember well, who was said to be acquainted with Nam-woon.

Hae-geon thought of a man he barely remembered, someone who claimed to know Nam-woon but whose face and name he couldn’t recall clearly. For the first time, Hae-geon tried to cover another’s pheromones with his own scent. But he failed. Even though the pheromones surrounding Nam-woon were faint, they were so firm, as if refusing to allow any other scent to mix in. He could feel his own pheromones, unable to blend, just floating weakly around him. He thought he might be able to remove a normal alpha’s pheromone shower, but is it difficult to remove a pheromone shower even with a dominant trait?

If that’s not it, then maybe the other person is also…

“Dominant.”

Hmm. Hae-geon let out a meaningless sound as he recalled the expressions he’d seen on Nam-woon’s face today.

The constantly shifting, emotion-filled expressions. It didn’t seem like they were actually dating yet. So there was someone else by Nam-woon’s side. But, well,

“That’s not so bad either.”

Hae-geon muttered indifferently.

***

On his way to the pharmacy, Nam-woon stopped by a convenience store.

“Hyung, I think it’d be nice to have a bench or something like that too!”

Remembering Se-han’s whispered suggestion, Nam-woon picked up a pair of work gloves. The ones at Seo-oh’s house had a big hole in the thumb.

As he left the convenience store and headed to the pharmacy, Nam-woon’s mind was filled with the sound of Seo-oh’s voice from school. He worried that Seo-oh might get talked about badly at school for saying they were close, but at the same time, he was glad he’d gone to school today. If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t have heard Seo-oh talk about him like that.

Nam-woon had a strange thought that he wouldn’t be able to forget Seo-oh’s voice today for a long time.

When he arrived at the pharmacy, Nam-woon dug through his pockets and said,

“One rut suppressant, please.”

“Is it for you?”

“Ah… no, it’s for a friend.”

Nam-woon answered awkwardly, and the pharmacist, eyeing him carefully, put a white box in a paper bag.

“This is a new one, it’s good. It comes with gel, too.”

“Oh, okay.”

Do you need gel for this? Well, the pharmacist would know better than him. Nam-woon handed over his card, paid, and grabbed the door handle. Then, on a sudden thought, he turned back to the counter.

“Actually, can I get one more rut suppressant?”