With his face smeared cruelly, marring its marble statue-like beauty, he was a sight so disquieting it bordered on grotesque.
“What are you doing, Jae-jin?”
Seo Eui-woo approached, roughly taking off the goggles on his head. A hologram was displayed on the goggle screen, and it was equipped with a voice transmitter and receiver.
“Is your house on fire? Or did you set it on fire?”
“…Let’s stay calm. Nothing happened.”
“Any injuries?”
Seo Eui-woo turned off the power of the goggles with a click. The rebar embedded in his body instantly turned to dust and disappeared, and a healing factor popped out of his chest pocket. Seo Eui-woo swiftly opened the healing factor and jabbed the needle into Kwon Jae-jin’s neck, injecting the bright blue potion into his vein.
“Were you trying to run away? Jump down… try to die…? What, really, what were you thinking! Are you crazy?”
Seo Eui-woo moved in quickly, grabbing Kwon Jae-jin’s arm and then, seemingly not enough, grabbed him by the scruff and dragged him away from the edge of the parapet. Blood dripped from the blood-soaked Seo Eui-woo, while Kwon Jae-jin, who had received a sprinkler’s drenching, was dripping with cold water.
“As you can see, I did this merely to call Seo Eui-woo out.”
Jae-jin held onto Seo Eui-woo’s shoulder with one hand and stopped him. While examining the blood running down Seo Eui-woo’s handsome cheek with obvious distaste, he spoke in a subdued voice.
“I have something to say.”
“Ah, that so… That makes sense. Of course, you’ve got something to say.”
“It’s important. Don’t erase my memory. Don’t delete it. I’ll explain the reasons now.”
“…Jae-jin, do you think that’s the sort of thing I’m going to listen to right now…?”
“It’s all related. Besides, if I don’t warn you this way in advance, you’ll definitely try to mess with my head again on your own accord.”
“Ha, right now, what I want to mess with isn’t Kwon Jae-jin’s head, but it seems like it’s that mouth of yours.”
Seo Eui-woo snapped at him in fury. The air flow twisted in an instant.
The drops of blood falling from him oddly vibrated as they rose and fell in the air, not soiling the rooftop but shooting upwards and circling around Seo Eui-woo.
His overwhelming presence changed the density of the atmosphere. It became difficult to breathe in the altered environment. Moreover, something invisible seemed to have grabbed Jae-jin’s jaw, rendering him immobile.
Seo Eui-woo was unnecessarily violent. It was like the first day they had met.
“In my opinion, Jae-jin, you should keep that mouth of yours shut. It’s nothing but trouble…”
Kwon Jae-jin stubbornly spoke up, resisting Seo Eui-woo’s telekinesis.
“That, rela, someone I, was, with, that… Seo, Seo’s, ugh…”
“Give up and open your mouth, before I start to like the idea of pulling out all thirty of your teeth.”
“Argh, hah, ack!”
“Not a bad idea, really. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to take one out just to try.”
The unseen force gripping his jaw doubled in strength. Not only was his mouth immobilized, but also his arms and legs—he couldn’t even flutter his eyelids. Speaking was no longer an option.
Seo Eui-woo, with gloved fingers, jammed two into the gaping mouth of Kwon Jae-jin. This was no guidance. With gloves on, he couldn’t touch the mucous membranes, hence no guiding was possible.
The fingers, driven deep inside, lightly tapped the left bottom wisdom tooth.
“Instead of thirty, twenty-nine. I’ll be the only one who knows about the reduced count…”
Carefully feeling the shape of the upper molars, he moved to the right bottom wisdom tooth.
“Missing a wisdom tooth won’t impair your life…”
The slow rubbing movement of his hand seemed as though he was deciding which one to extract. After a while, he retracted his hand without choosing either side.
Seo Eui-woo looked down at Jae-jin with a chilling gaze.
Normally, Jae-jin would have been able to see his gray pupils, but now the blood-soaked black hair hung over his eyes, casting shadows on his face.
Beneath the shadowy eye sockets, the blood-stained eyelashes occasionally came into view, and deeper still, the pupil glinted with a killer instinct, quietly lying in wait.
“I really don’t understand. I warned you that there won’t be a second time…”
Despite Seo Eui-woo’s fierce eyes, he whispered soothingly.
His voice was unusually gentle, as though deliberately feigned.
“Jae-jin, do you want to be handcuffed…? Or are you optimistic that I won’t do such a thing…? Do you trust me?”
“Keugh… You, you…”
“I’ve never trusted Kwon Jae-jin, not even once.”
“…”
“It was more like, I was just letting you off…”
Seo Eui-woo narrowed his eyes and matched the gaze with Kwon Jae-jin. After staring at him for a while, he let out a bland laugh.
“I’m going to knock you out. No more mercy. Sleep until you come back after cleaning up the fire and serving your unauthorized leave punishment.”
Without hesitation, Seo Eui-woo strangled Kwon Jae-jin. Initially, he contemplated knocking him out with a blow to the solar plexus, but he wasn’t sure he could control his strength properly. A strong blow riddled with special abilities could crush Kwon Jae-jin’s body. Healing factor aside, it would be dreadful to accidentally kill him.
The physiological struggle in Kwon Jae-jin’s body weakened, and as his body sagged, Seo Eui-woo propped him up with one arm and whispered.
“I won’t mess with your memory… instead, know that I’m keeping you tied up.”
“…”
“See you later.”
✧˚·̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥·̩̩̥͙✧·̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥˚·̩̩̥͙✧ 𝑔𝓇𝒶𝓋𝒾𝓉𝓎𝓃𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁𝓈 ✧˚·̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥·̩̩̥͙✧·̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥˚·̩̩̥͙✧
