By Zephyria Hugo gripped the doorknobs lining the hallway, just as Leonardo had done, and shook them several times. If a door didn’t seem to open after a couple of tries, he immediately moved on to the next one. He had failed like that three times already. He could have given up, but he devised another method.
Bang—!
He simply ripped the doorknob off with force, then kicked the door relentlessly with his booted foot.
The door, its locking mechanism broken, fluttered precariously before colliding with the opposite wall. The noise echoing through the hallway quieted the wandering murmurs. Hugo didn’t care.
After looking left and right once, he forcibly pushed Leonardo inside and stepped into the room himself.
Click, cut off from the outside, Leonardo leaned his back against the inside of the door. Hugo placed his hand on the interlocking door frame, still gripping the other’s warmth with his other hand.
The crumpled doorknob fell powerlessly to the dark wooden floor. Leonardo, trapped between the door and the man, was very concerned that his fingers intertwined with his might be trembling.
However, as he got close enough to the other that their breaths touched, all his distractions flew away. He was just confused about the reason for his pounding heart. Was it the aftermath of the tension from running away, or was it because of this person?
There was a hole smaller than a fist where the torn-off doorknob had been. Faint light came in from there, and everything else was darkness.
The room, infiltrated in an illegal way, was quiet. Only irregular, low breaths occasionally brushed by. So this situation, alone with the man he had always imagined, was elevated to the point of being uncomfortably like a moment of illicit love.
Hidden by his broad shoulders, or captivated by his sharply defined eyes, he had no energy to examine the interior. It wasn’t very wide, but it didn’t matter. At this moment, the world only existed in the gap between each other.
Just as his senses, sharpened as he grew accustomed to the darkness, began to explore each other, the hand that had been holding the door frame came down and brushed under his golden eyelashes.
“…Ah.”
A reflexive exclamation flowed from Leonardo’s lips. His eyelids, faithfully responding to the touch, trembled finely, tickling his fingers. A faint delight spread in his flushed eyes, but Hugo couldn’t see it. Nevertheless, Hugo was overcome with a strange sense of déjà vu. It was because of that that he rubbed away the tears that hadn’t even formed with his thumb, and uncharacteristically frowned.
As if trying to confirm something, he grabbed the end of the veil covering his face and pulled it somewhat roughly. Swish, the soft fabric easily slid down his golden hair.
The loose hat, not fitting properly, fell to his feet with a thud. He hooked his finger on the mask that was hanging over the bridge of his nose and pulled it down. Leonardo’s skin tingled and throbbed from the hasty yet careful touch on the bridge of his nose.
He was swept up in a strange feeling as if his clothes were being taken off, but he didn’t stop him. He simply looked up at the other person when he was freed from the veil that had been covering him.
“……”
It was Leonardo who was out of breath, but a sigh came from Hugo. His forehead, which had been full of tension, relaxed, and then bluish blood vessels became prominent.
It was a clear and lovely face that darkness or clothing couldn’t hide. The light coming in from his waist spread over his beautiful face, creating a faint outline. Two golden eyes embedded within it were directed solely at him.
Hugo’s Adam’s apple rose and fell, and his eyes narrowed as he feigned the most indifferent voice possible.
“Found you.”
Leonardo’s spine tingled for a moment, not only because of his muffled voice, contrary to his intentions. Was it because of the lingering image of that day, or was it praise and joy for the man who had found him once again?
He could feel the pulse beating in every joint of their connected hands. At the end of it, the past desires and anguish to reach each other were intertwined.
It was so clear that they had the same heart that there was no time to gauge his intentions. Leonardo couldn’t help but smile. It was close to a cynical laugh, but it was enough to break down the tense atmosphere.
It was like the warm afternoon sunlight that could melt even the person he was facing. His blue eyes were moved by it and shone with a mysterious color.
To remove the black curtain that was obscuring his vision, Hugo rubbed Leonardo’s entire cheek with a thick touch. The skin that was caught in his large hand was moist and damp. He felt that it was a little hotter than the temperature he remembered, and then he grabbed the golden hair that touched his index finger and twisted it as if he were interrogating him.
“Is this because of our promise?”
Leonardo’s spine trembled finely at the whispering voice. Was this also the effect of that compound? His voice had only gotten a little closer, but all his nerves were on edge and his lower abdomen was uncomfortably constricted.
It had only been less than three minutes since they had suddenly encountered each other and made contact. Leonardo was worried about his unusually sensitive reaction, so he pressed his back against the wall, even though there was nowhere to retreat.
In turn, he casually raised his eyebrows as if he had plenty of time. He was asking what he meant, but soon he realized the meaning himself.
“Ah.”
He had made a promise with this person before they parted ways. Not to use Forbidden magic in front of him.
The air at that time brushed through his mind like a lingering image.
‘So I can recognize you.’
The man’s lips, which had been assuming a sweet future, caught his eye again today without fail.
Was the gold that maintained its complete color a sign of him? The eyes that feigned abstinence and the playful hands that tormented his hair asked persistently.
Leonardo didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he looked back on his actions over the past few months, when he had given all sorts of reasons to cover his face with masks and hats, and yet tried to refrain from using ‘that magic’.
Honestly, there were more than a few situations where it almost became a hassle. Today was one of them.
If he had lived as someone other than himself while wandering the world as before, the probability of being followed and the risk of having to silence someone would have been significantly reduced. But even knowing that there were forces watching him, he persuaded himself that it was to prevent variables that could occur during the competition, and eventually participated in the league in his true form.
It was a product of his desire to stand before the world as himself, and the complex desire to enjoy the freedom he had been given.
Can he be sure that the promise with this man wasn’t at the base of all those choices?
Leonardo’s inner self shook his head.
That’s why he went out of his way to use the obvious pseudonym ‘Leo’.
His troubled golden eyes went down to his feet. As he pondered how to answer, he raised his drooping hand and went up the other’s forearm. His hand stroked the man’s broad shoulders and then his firm jaw with the back of his hand. Then, as he had done before, it slipped behind his flushed neck.
People in the world couldn’t even imagine it. That this cold man’s nape was actually so hot.
He smiled softly, believing it was a secret only he knew. Leonardo asked softly.
“If so?”
Hugo’s closed lips gradually tightened. The intention felt in the languidly caressing hand was obvious.
Surely it was him who had fallen into the trap he had set. Rather, he felt like he was trying to find gold in the mud and was being dragged in with him. He had no intention of resisting.
Hugo laughed at his foolishness a few hours ago, when he was worried about what kind of face he should make when he met Leonardo again, and what would be good for his first greeting. Even if he had prepared the famous writings of any poet, it would have been useless. Ridiculously, he couldn’t think of anything now.
Instead of answering, he changed the posture of the hand that had been caressing Leonardo’s cheek. The grip that had been suppressing his ego gave in to the desire to pry open his soft lips.
As if remembering what he had taught him with care, his reddened lips responded to it and parted slightly. But it was quickly buried without a trace in the man’s lust that approached.
“I definitely heard it from this way?”
Three reporters who had been wandering around the area because of the sound of the door breaking came running. They stood in the middle of the hallway and looked around.
There was no one, and there were no open doors. But the fact that there had been such a loud noise clearly meant that someone was nearby. They had run from both ends and met in the middle, so they could tell just by looking at each other that there was no one they had met on the way.
So their guess was that the target was hiding somewhere in this hallway.
“Didn’t they go in somewhere?”
“Open them one by one.”
The three scattered in different directions. They each pushed and pulled the doorknobs lined up in a row.
However, only the noise of the metal locking mechanisms rubbing against each other echoed in succession. The search continued for about a minute.
Just as he was about to scratch the back of his head, thinking that it was another fruitless search, and move on,
“Huh?”
Just as he was about to reach the end of the hallway, he spotted a door that looked particularly suspicious. It was because that was the only place where the doorknob wasn’t attached. The reporter who discovered it first shut his mouth and walked stealthily towards it as if possessed.
He glanced around nervously for no reason. Even though they had run together, he was eager to monopolize the high-level information on his own.
The reporter knelt down on one knee and peered into the empty doorknob hole.
Could they have broken the door and gone inside? He had searched all the other places, but this was the only door that didn’t have a handle attached to it. He put one eye to the hole. It was hard to see inside because it was dark, but suddenly he felt a slight movement inside.
“…?”
This time, he put his ear close to it. Even so, he stroked the dent in the surface of the door with his hand. An irregular vibration occurred. It was as if something was constantly pushing against the door, and its momentum was fierce.
‘Is someone there?’
The air inside was extremely dry, but a humid and hot energy flowed out from the inside. He could also hear the sound of clothes brushing against each other from time to time. It was certain that someone was there. But it was difficult to move rashly because it could be someone from the operations headquarters.
Of course, there was no way to know what they were doing in a place like this without turning on the lights.
The reporter, who wasn’t sure, instinctively took out the portable recorder he always carried with him. He pressed the button to turn it on, and then carefully tried to push it into the gap in the empty doorknob.