“…I understand that Young Master Joo Tae-hyun and you regularly, ahem, regularly share Pheromone exchanges.”
“Doctor Han, you haven’t forgotten that Joo Tae-hyun is an Alpha, have you?”
That’s right. Joo Tae-hyun was the only person I’d been intimate with recently.
Even if one of us had briefly met someone else in between, we had been so relentlessly entwined that no one else’s Pheromones could possibly have lingered. No, there was no need to even mention someone else’s Pheromones. Those few days had been so intense and debauched that even my own unique scent seemed to have vanished.
If the criteria for determining an Imprinting partner were the frequency and intensity of sexual relations, then yes. Joo Tae-hyun was the only one who fit the bill.
But even so, an Alpha couldn’t Imprint on another Alpha. Also, Imprinting wasn’t something that could happen just from having sex a few times.
“Excuse me, but were the exchanges perhaps frequent?”
“…Even so—”
“Then there might be a possibility. You are not in a completely Alpha state right now. If the number of exchanges was quite frequent in the midst of that… it wouldn’t be unreasonable for the Director’s Alpha Shifter to instinctively regard you as an Imprinting partner.”
“…”
“Furthermore, what happened today seems to have had a significant impact. Although a Shifter’s Pheromones don’t act as a bridge for emotions, if a partner with a high probability of Imprinting experiences a major shock, your body might have decided to rush the Imprinting in order to protect him.”
Doctor Han then added a few more conjectures. Perhaps the surgery wasn’t difficult, and the recovery was so rapid, because my body was saturated with the Pheromones of an Imprinting partner.
“…What about Tae-hyun? What are Tae-hyun’s Imprinting levels?”
“I was worried about how a blood test might react to the medication, so I’ve only prescribed an IV drip for now. Should we proceed with the test?”
“No, you did well. It’s never a bad thing to be cautious. Then, Doctor, do you think there’s a high probability that Tae-hyun has Imprinted on me as well?”
“Hmm, I’m sorry, but I can’t say anything about Young Master at the moment… His current Pheromone state is so unstable that we lack indicators other than the numerical values.”
“Indicators other than the numerical values?”
“Hmm. For example, if your recovery rate was faster than average, like the Director’s, we could speculate that it’s due to the influence of Imprinting, but on the contrary, Young Master’s condition is excessively poor…”
Seo Baek-han stared intently at the ceiling for a moment before closing his eyes. The stark white fluorescent light, typical of hospitals, poured onto his eyeballs through his thin eyelids as if hammering them.
So, Doctor Han was indirectly saying that I seemed to have Imprinted on Joo Tae-hyun alone.
“Of course, everything will be known once we conduct the blood test. This is just speculation, so please don’t worry too much about it—”
“That’s only the case when it’s not an emergency.”
I had been stabbed and even undergone surgery, yet I was healing so quickly thanks to the Imprinting phenomenon and those damned Pheromones, while Joo Tae-hyun still couldn’t even open his eyes.
Well, if it were a mutual Imprinting, an adult man wouldn’t be so weak after just having some sex.
Joo Tae-hyun definitely hadn’t Imprinted on me.
Thanks to the widely known case of Prince Lee and the Prince’s Consort, many people regarded the Imprinting phenomenon as a sign of destined love, but Imprinting was merely a mysterious chemical reaction caused by a Shifter’s body.
Just as Joo Tae-hyun’s backside became wet like an Omega for some unknown reason, my body’s Alpha Shifter might also have made an absurd mistake. Originally, Shifterology was said to be a field where everything was unpredictable except for the three letters ‘Shifterology’ itself.
So, I knew that there was no need to consider abstract and embarrassing things like the size of one’s heart or the degree of sincerity when it came to the Imprinting phenomenon. As the youngest Director of the Royal Hospital and having even served as the president of an international academic society, I knew that better than anyone.
But why was the fact that I had Imprinted alone so irritating…?
Could this also be the aftermath of those shitty Pheromones?
“…Anyway, don’t worry about Tae-hyun. Doctor Woo will be up here tomorrow anyway, so he’ll take care of the tests and let us know immediately if there’s anything wrong with the results. Now that the precious youngest Young Master has an Imprinting partner, they won’t be able to hide it from us, even if they’re worried about Joo Tae-hyun’s condition.”
“Yes. Then, we’ll inform Young Master of the Director’s results as soon as he regains consciousness—”
“No, keep my results a secret.”
“Yes? But…”
“I’m going to break the Imprinting. Without Tae-hyun knowing.”
Had he taken it as a joke? Doctor Han’s face gradually turned pale as he silently waited for Seo Baek-han’s next words.
“Director… Forcibly breaking an Imprinting has considerable side effects. Even if it’s a one-sided Imprinting, we don’t know what kind of impact it will have on the other party, and above all, we can’t rule out the possibility that Young Master has Imprinted on you—”
“Doctor Han. Are you saying that Tae-hyun or I will die if an Imprinting is broken?”
“…”
“There may be side effects, but I don’t think there have been any cases of death due to Imprinting disruption so far. Then that’s enough. What else did you say? Ah, even if Tae-hyun has Imprinted on me… Yes, it doesn’t matter. I’m going to break it no matter what.”
“Director…”
“Do you understand? Whether it’s a one-sided Imprinting or a mutual Imprinting, that’s not the point. Doctor, I can’t stand the thought of my body and mind being bound to someone against my will.”
There were countless side effects that could occur when forcibly breaking an Imprinting. From Pheromone dysfunction to Heat abnormalities, and even the possibility of having difficulty forming an Imprinting with someone else in the future.
But Seo Baek-han had never wanted an Imprinting in the first place. He sometimes found it annoying that he couldn’t control his Heat cycle without taking Suppressants, but the thought of someone other than himself being able to control everything about him was unbearable.
If possible, Seo Baek-han wanted to extract all the cells in his blood vessels and replace them with new ones right now.
Imprinted on Joo Tae-hyun? And all by myself, getting drunk on his unstable Pheromones? Furthermore, I was already being influenced by Joo Tae-hyun’s Pheromones without even knowing it?
“…Ha.”
Sex with Joo Tae-hyun… Yes, it was fun. It was also novel, and above all, very convenient.
I wouldn’t deny that he was doing an excellent job as a partner. He had always been that way, but his handling of this attack was particularly impressive.
But that didn’t mean I wanted to Imprint on Joo Tae-hyun. This was a different matter from a marriage that could be resolved by submitting divorce papers. It was a matter of each other’s lives, their very lives. Yes, their destinies being held hostage.
Anger without a target or purpose flared up, but soon calmed down. On the one hand, it was because I finally understood why I had been acting as if I had lost my mind during sex with Joo Tae-hyun.
If the reason I had been gradually becoming more lenient with Joo Tae-hyun recently, and the reason I had been particularly responsive to his Pheromones, was because of the Imprinting, which was an abnormal phenomenon…
“As you said at the beginning, please discard the test results. And I would like you to keep this matter a secret until I ask you again.”
It was an order disguised as a request, telling even Seo Baek-han himself not to mention it. Doctor Han hesitated for a moment, as if he still had something to say, before slowly nodding his head as if he couldn’t help it.
* * *
“Looks like he’s about to open his eyes.”
Joo Tae-hyun was dazed for a while even after barely lifting his heavy eyelids.
The sound of IV drips falling, the piercing noise of the oxygen saturation monitor, the cold air circulating in the hospital room.
His five senses gradually returned, and a little later, he recognized the space he was lying in. It was around that time that he realized who the person looking down at him from the bedside was.
“…Ah, cough, Father.”
“What use are you if your body is so weak? People will misunderstand. They’ll say you ran away because you didn’t want to do troublesome work.”
“…I’m sorry.”
“As I always say, Tae-hyun. I prefer people who act rather than talk.”
Assemblyman Seo Hong-gyu clicked his tongue briefly as if dissatisfied and naturally took a seat on the stool in the hospital room. He looked as if it was only natural for him to be the master of this space, and in reality, he was. Joo Tae-hyun had to force his uncomfortable body up just to make proper eye contact with him.