By Zephyria 
Kim Si-baek looked up at the beaming Tae-un, swallowed a sigh, and stood up.
“I’ll be back in a moment.”
After taking Biyendwe from the crown of his head and placing him on Lee Han-gyeol’s lap, Kim Si-baek left the laboratory with Tae-un without a word.
‘…The avatar of a god? What is that?’
He pondered the words Kim Si-baek had left behind for a long while, but he still couldn’t fully grasp them. However, the ability was a truth he had witnessed with his own eyes, and he trusted Tae-un, who trusted Kim Si-baek. Even if Tae-un pointed at a passing human and told him it was a magical beast and to kill it, he would believe it was right. If someone like Tae-un vouched for Kim Si-baek, he could trust him.
After hesitating, Lee Han-gyeol carefully lifted the baby crow with its vicious expression, which was staring up at him with wide, clear eyes from his lap.
The guild members who had been drinking coffee in the lounge or lounging in massage chairs hurriedly scrambled out before they could even meet Tae-un’s bleak gaze. In an instant, only Kim Si-baek and Tae-un remained in the empty lounge.
“….”
At any other time, he might have complained about why Kim Si-baek had gone alone without eating breakfast, or how lonely he felt waking up to find his brother gone, but Tae-un simply looked down with a quiet smile.
His intention was clear. He, who had always vomited his longing first, was now waiting for Kim Si-baek’s actions. Kim Si-baek felt his throat grow dry to the point of stinging and raised his hand. Past the scar that cleaved his face, toward the traces of magical energy engraved like a tattoo.
“How is your body? You should have rested more, why did you come down?”
“The detoxification is complete, and suppressing the magical energy is the same as usual.”
“The part about it being an erogenous zone was a lie, wasn’t it?”
“If you touch me, you might notice the magical energy.”
“I can’t tell just by touching you without the intention of analyzing the energy.”
“That’s good. Then keep touching me.”
Tae-un leaned his waist forward, asking for more. What kind of excuse was this now? As Kim Si-baek let out a bitter smile and pulled his hand away, Tae-un asked.
“When can you treat me again?”
“Even if it feels like you’re fine, the toxic energy was there for so long that your body must have been strained during the purification. So, after you’ve recovered a bit?”
“You’ll definitely purify me once I’ve recovered, right?”
Kim Si-baek closed his lips. The meaning implied in Tae-un’s words was simple. If divine power dwelled in the body, the senses would become hypersensitive, and he would be unable to control the desire for the person caressing him. Yesterday ended with masturbation, but what about next time?
“Brother.”
The low voice flowing into his ear awakened a poignant sense of déjà vu, and Kim Si-baek slowly recalled it.
Ah, right. A dream. That dream. A dream where he became an Olympic gold medalist and his younger brother survived and they reunited. A dream of a future where everything unfolded happily, leaving only Tae-un behind in a semi-basement room.
It was the voice he had heard in that dream. Now, the only child in this world who called him brother.
Even though it was merely a vain dream, recalling it made his heart ache again. What could possibly be happy when a young Tae-un was abandoned in a semi-basement room?
“You said the future of destruction you witnessed wasn’t much different from the present. If so, it would happen within a few years at most…”
“….”
“You’ve lived a long time until now, and if you return to mak slecht, you’ll live an even longer time, right?”
Kim Si-baek stared at his own reflection in those dark, deep eyes. He felt a profound sensation, as if that boundless, deep darkness was meticulously searching through him and swallowing him whole.
“This time will be but a brief moment, a mere fragment in your long life.”
The child who had looked up blankly from that semi-basement room was now looking down at him. With those unchangingly deep eyes. Kim Si-baek had wondered, even at a young age, how a five-year-old child’s eyes could be so distant.
“Could you give me just one piece that will break off from your long life?”
〈Who will you choose, me or that child?〉
Perhaps because he had been recalling the dream, that question from the dream overlapped with Tae-un’s voice and echoed in his mind. He shook his head lightly to shake off the memory of the dream. It wasn’t a matter where he could make a choice or a decision, nor was it reality.
The only thing clear was the existence of the living Tae-un before him. Yes, only that. The existence of the one he would be parted from forever upon returning.
〈I hope that child slowly forgets the time spent with me, so that eventually, I fade into the shadow of a memory.〉
But he would not be able to forget this child easily. He knew the child’s longing and had faced the desire that would eventually swallow him whole. When they faced each other, the heat that transferred into him was of a different but similar hue to the child’s.
He intuited that this relationship would not be perceived by him as simply partners sharing bodies, as Tae-un desired. The presence of Tae-un within Kim Si-baek was far greater and heavier than Tae-un thought. The intersection of lives, spanning barely nine years, had shaped Kim Si-baek’s present and ensured he did not forget the past.
〈You’ll be going back soon anyway, Brother.〉
And Tae-un severs the future. While pouring out a longing he cannot hide, he thoroughly denies the future.
For Kim Si-baek and Tae-un, the future is absent.
Knowing that this premise is utterly correct, there is an impulse to deny it. That while you wish for me to forget you, I will not be able to. That even if I am not in your future, my future will contain you.
“…How could it be a mere fragment of a moment?”
Suppressing the impulse that must not be conveyed to him, he embraced the child within himself. After pondering for a very long time, he still cannot know exactly what this piece of heat transferred from you is. As you claimed, we might be in a relationship that does not change no matter what we mix or shake.
Therefore, even in this moment, hesitation gripped his ankles. He sensed that he would regret this choice in the future. Not because the relationship changed, but for another reason. Because of the existence of the child who would swallow him from within.
Even while anticipating regret, Kim Si-baek could not ultimately shake off the sole and absolute selfishness of not wanting to lose the child inside him.
He slowly placed his hand on Tae-un’s shoulder.
“You’re tall. Lean down a bit more.”
Tae-un’s head tilted diagonally. Kim Si-baek brought his lips to the mouth that was parted slightly as if waiting. A faint breath hovered over Tae-un’s lips, which were holding their breath, before they lightly overlapped. He sucked lightly enough to make a ‘chu’ sound, and only then did Tae-un’s breath slowly rise.
As he felt their breaths shallowly mingle and pulled his lips away, Tae-un’s hand roughly cupped his cheek, as if the previous obedience had been a lie. The tongue that had been quietly curled inside the mouth licked his lips and pulled his waist in. Their lips and bodies pressed tightly together, without room for a single sheet of paper to fit between them.
Tae-un lifted Kim Si-baek’s arm, which had been awkwardly resting on his shoulder. When he ended up hugging his neck, a satisfied smile hung on his lips. Before he could say anything, a soft piece of flesh slid deep into his mouth.
“Hng, mm…”
The tongue, pushing deep into the throat as if it would reach the uvula, poked the inside and roughly scraped the roof of the mouth. In the deep kiss that rampaged and swallowed him at will, he felt dizzy, as if not only the air in his mouth but his very soul was being sucked out.
Kim Si-baek let out a short breath and entwined his tongue with Tae-un’s. Tae-un, who seemed to hesitate for a moment, tilted his face to the side and locked their lips more deeply. The sound of saliva mixing and flesh sticking together echoed obscenely in his ears. It was more explicit and immediate than the kiss of that night, a confirmation of sexual pleasure that fluttered wetly and stimulated the senses.
Tae-un’s fingers pressed the line of his lower back and gripped his buttocks tightly, while the large hand holding his cheek and neck gripped him as if not to let go, and the entangled flesh sucked and licked the saliva and tongue. All those sensations were vividly engraved. Blood rushed to his lower body, and his skin flushed hot.
How must Tae-un have felt that night, experiencing all these sensations even more acutely? As that thought suddenly occurred to him, he remembered how terrifyingly erect Tae-un had been.
“Ah.”
As if reading his mind, the thickly swollen lower body rubbed against Kim Si-baek’s. He gasped at the stifling pressure felt between his own legs.
“Haa…”
As their lips parted, ragged breaths poured out. The root of the tongue, which had been pulled hard, stung, and his lips, which had been rubbed and bitten several times, were sore from being thoroughly explored, yet Tae-un’s eyes remained hungry and unsatisfied.
Licking up the saliva that hadn’t been fully swallowed from his lips with his tongue, Tae-un whispered.