TTOA Chapter 30

#30

For a moment, I felt like a storm had swept through the bedroom.

Seo Eui-woo stopped abruptly, staring down at Kwon Jae-jin with a hardened expression. He met his unwavering gaze with those black eyes, and slowly his face contorted. His thick eyebrows rose sharply in a crooked line, and the muscles below his jaw tightened.

“…Me?”

Seo Eui-woo’s voice was low. The deep tone scratched against the floor, sounding ominous.

“Jae-jin said he dated me…? And that was, like, in the future…?”

Seo Eui-woo’s gray eyes were filled with suspicion. Understandably so. Even to Kwon Jae-jin, talking about the future sounded absurd. Besides, he was saying it while handcuffed, so it was only natural to think it was a lie to get out of the situation.

“Yes, Seo Eui-woo asked me to date him. After a lot of thought, I accepted.”

“Are you seriously asking me to believe such nonsense? Do you think I’m some kind of… moron?”

Seo Eui-woo frowned even deeper. His cold, frozen gray eyes sharpened.

Just as I thought. He doesn’t believe me.

Kwon Jae-jin let out a heavy sigh. He gave a bitter smile and mumbled slowly.

“…It’s not a lie. I know personal things about Seo Eui-woo that he hasn’t told me. Back in the Center training camp, you couldn’t sleep alone every night because you were in distress, right?”

“That kind of thing can be inferred from the context.”

“A cramped, three-tiered bunk bed. Unable to escape from a bed much smaller than Seo Eui-woo’s body, unable to turn on the lights or toss and turn for fear of disturbing the sleep of other colleagues, every night feeling like torture, trapped alone in the dark. I heard it directly from you.”

“…”

“There are a total of three elevators in this house. One for people, one for cargo, and one for emergencies. Do you think I set the fire without any thought? I knew that the sprinklers would go off in case of a fire and that the emergency elevator would be activated. And I know the password to Seo Eui-woo’s safe in the study.”

Before starting the fire, Kwon Jae-jin had gone to the study on the second floor for a moment on the way to the exhibition room with the bottle of alcohol. Just in case, he had opened the safe in the study, and had already confirmed that the password he knew was correct.

“0807. Isn’t that the date when Seo Eui-woo officially completed the Esper training course and was assigned to his first mission? That’s what I heard.”

Kwon Jae-jin blinked his tired eyes hazily.

His body was cold, he felt chills, and he was dizzy. His stomach hurt from drinking only high-proof alcohol on an empty stomach, and his head ached from the hangover. There were clear bruise marks on his wrist where the handcuffs had pressed.

Unable to hide his fatigue, Jae-jin whispered in a self-abandoning tone.

“From A to Z, Seo Eui-woo told me everything. That you have a mole in some weird place, like your armpit or something, that you have impacted wisdom teeth and thirty-two teeth, that your body is soft, that you have a baby’s mouth, who else but Seo Eui-woo would say such nonsense? No one else says such things to me.”

“Then… is it really me?”

Seo Eui-woo asked back suspiciously. He still seemed to be half in doubt. Kwon Jae-jin nodded his head harshly and replied.

“Yes, it’s Seo Eui-woo. It’s you, Seo Eui-woo.”

“Jae-jin… did you date me?”

“Yes. In four years.”

“Then, Jae-jin… did you come to like me?”

“…Yes. In four years.”

“What about now?”

“…”

“What about now?”

“…”

As if trying to avoid the difficult answer, Kwon Jae-jin shook his arm. The chain connected to the handcuffs rattled.

“More than that, could you please unlock these first? My arm hurts… it’s annoying… and I’m starting to feel bad…”

“Answer first. I still don’t plan on believing Kwon Jae-jin.”

“…Don’t rush me. I’m not in the mood to answer such questions. After sticking weird things in my dick…”

“Well, Kwon Jae-jin tried to set fire to the house and jump off the roof, didn’t he? Ha… thinking about it makes my stomach churn again. What were you thinking… why did you do that?”

“…”

“No, it doesn’t make sense. If I was your lover, there would be no reason to commit arson and jump off a building, why?”

“…Memories.”

Kwon Jae-jin moved his lips. He wasn’t sure what to say. He was afraid of losing his memories, and he was afraid of losing Kwon Jae-jin’s Seo Eui-woo. He didn’t want the future to change, and yet he was in a situation where he had to accept the changed future. It was too long of a story to compress into a few short words.

“I thought I might lose my memories… so I thought I had to settle things somehow… I drank and did it in a fit of pique…”

“What?”

“I know it’s hard to believe. But what can I do, it’s true…”

“…”

“Please believe me, Seo Eui-woo. Not just humoring me.”

“…”

“I’m asking you to believe me.”

Seo Eui-woo, who had lowered his long, thin eyelashes, slowly reached out his hand. He took hold of the silver chain that ran from the wedge in the wall to the handcuffs at the end and slowly stroked it. He stared at the red ring-shaped mark on his wrist with an unreadable look, then raised his head and looked at Kwon Jae-jin, who was struggling.

“Then, let me.”

Let you what?

“Memories.”

Not erase them, just confirm them.

Seo Eui-woo smiled gently and languidly.

His clear face was terribly beautiful. A sculptural work of art with perfect symmetry. Gray eyes swirling with extraordinary and omnipotent power. I can’t dare to resist, and I feel fear and awe, the strongest living being in human existence…

Kwon Jae-jin knew. Even in this moment, Seo Eui-woo was humoring him.

From the beginning, Seo Eui-woo could have tied up and controlled Kwon Jae-jin whenever he wanted. If he had a mental-type ability, he would have had plenty of opportunities to erase Jae-jin’s memories and use him as a tool.

If he scraped out everything in Kwon Jae-jin’s head and left only infantile memories… then, Jae-jin would become an idiot who knew nothing and would become a slave who would devote his Guiding as Seo Eui-woo ordered. Seo Eui-woo could easily throw Kwon Jae-jin into a dark abyss, but he didn’t.

In fact, his life itself is like that.

Even though he has that much power… even though he’s suppressing such powerful authority in his small body… why doesn’t he just explode it mercilessly?

Without anyone’s help, in a place where no one knows, enduring the pain of imbalance alone, fighting, getting hurt, and sacrificing himself for humanity?

I thought he was an abnormal madman who was born beyond human common sense and had no humanity, but maybe that’s not the case.

In fact, Seo Eui-woo may have been more sensible and human than anyone else.

If it were Kwon Jae-jin, he would have been so angry that he would have killed and overturned everything he saw…

“…Alright, do it.”

Kwon Jae-jin muttered, half resigned and half pitiful.

“If you’re just going to read it, I don’t care. Do it.”

“Are you really okay with it? I might be deceiving Jae-jin.”

Jae-jin had opened his heart and felt at ease, but Seo Eui-woo still couldn’t shake his suspicion. Even as he looked at Kwon Jae-jin with a more relaxed expression, his eyes were still sharp. He was analyzing, gauging, discerning, and suspicious of Kwon Jae-jin.

That was heartbreaking.

“Yes, I know.”

“Even though I say I’m just going to read it, the real intention might be to rummage through Jae-jin’s head and empty it.”

“Are you trying to scare me? I don’t have any other options in this situation. And I can’t just tell Seo Eui-woo to trust me.”

“…”

“I’ll trust Seo Eui-woo first and give you my memories, so please check them and Seo Eui-woo please trust Kwon Jae-jin too. That’s all I need.”

“…”

“What are you doing? Hurry up and look into my head. My arm hurts, I’m cold, and I want to pull out that thing that pierced my dick…”

The frozen gray eyes widened slightly.

Even so, he didn’t seem to expect Kwon Jae-jin to give up his memories so easily. Of course, he thought it would be a shallow lie to get out of the moment. If he told him to read his memories, then…

“It’s real…”

“Well, I told you that from the beginning.”

“You really came from the future to the past?”

Seo Eui-woo, realizing Kwon Jae-jin’s straight and firm will, covered his chin with the back of his hand.

“Ah.”

A pink tint slowly appeared on Seo Eui-woo’s white and innocent face.

He covered his face, his fingertips trembling slightly, and bowed his head as if he was embarrassed. A little pinkish color appeared on the ear that stuck out between his black curly hair. His severed ear had fully grown back to its original state.

“That’s, that’s right. Kwon Jae-jin is really strange. How could this happen?”

“That’s what I’m saying. But from my point of view, Seo Eui-woo moving things without touching them, teleporting, and regressing are all equally amazing. I don’t see much difference.”

“Ah…”

“So, the memories? When are you going to read them?”

“No, wait, let me calm down a bit. I can’t touch your head when I’m excited… it’s dangerous…”

Seo Eui-woo took a deep breath.