By Zephyria 
The possibility that his mother had spoken of the family she abandoned to her half-siblings. The possibility that those half-siblings had not forgotten and still remembered.
And the possibility that they knew his brother’s whereabouts.
These faint possibilities, derived from “what ifs,” shook Cloud’s rationality.
‘If they provided information on the half-siblings instead of my brother, he might already be dead.’
If he judged coldly, this was the more likely scenario. Yet, while endlessly denying those slim possibilities, Cloud ultimately opened a new email window.
It was to request an investigation into the half-siblings and their family based on the materials received from the anonymous sender.
✽ ✽ ✽
Perhaps because it was a question similar to what he had heard in his dream, Tae-un’s words lingered in his mind for an unusually long time. If his younger brother had survived, would that child have remembered him, just as his mother and Hyo-ju Agnes did?
Following these vacant thoughts, Kim Si-baek eventually let out a bitter smile and focused on dinner. What was this meaningless rambling about a brother who had died long ago?
Dinner was tteokbokki they had ordered. Biyendwe, who had been hovering around the delicious scent, quickly gave up upon seeing the bright red sauce of the tteokbokki and instead pecked at some frozen Shine Muscat grapes.
The TV was noisy with the government’s recent announcement regarding the conquest of the Gaeseong South Field. While it was occasional for private guilds to hunt in North Korean fields at the request of the North Korean government, this was the first time since the Great Cataclysm that a conquest was being carried out in full cooperation with North Korea.
“Spring has arrived on the Korean Peninsula, and it has become a natural sight for our hunters to step onto North Korean soil by crossing the old ceasefire line rather than through China, but even so, this is nothing short of joyful news.”
“On the other hand, it also means that the magical beasts of the Gaeseong South Field are that strong, right?”
The panelists exchanged stories, synthesizing information for the viewers. Kim Si-baek, who was absorbing the information as if it were being spoon-fed without having to struggle through internet searches, marveled at it.
“There are five S-class magical beasts in Gaeseong? Even if it practically includes northern Gyeonggi, isn’t it too narrow for five of them to be there?”
“Originally there were only two, but they gradually increased.”
“How come?”
“When they traced the paths back, it seemed they were chased out by the kun of the Han River while trying to expand their territory.”
It meant that five S-class magical beasts were struggling and bumping into each other in a cramped space, yet they didn’t dare venture south.
[Death and Beauty comments that the fellow in the Han River is nothing short of a thug and trembles at the thought of him.]
“Indeed…”
Kim Si-baek imagined the bizarre fish—no, the kun—that not only monopolized the Han River but also drove out the magical beasts meddling in the vast city of Seoul. Tae-un gave a short laugh.
“Still, thanks to the kun, there are no more S-class magical beasts in Seoul. Seoul was devastated from the beginning of the Great Cataclysm, and if S-class magical beasts had appeared early on, quite a few refugees would have died. Although we did have to take a massive detour to avoid the kun when we escaped Seoul.”
Kim Si-baek chewed his tteokbokki while listening to the vivid firsthand account. The sweetness of the sweet potato in the rice cake spread through his mouth. As he neutralized the sweetness with the spicy sauce, he suddenly paused.
He felt a strange sensation on his ankle. It felt as if something was touching and groping his ankle.
The only person sitting opposite him was Tae-un. Since the boy was tall and had long legs, he must have touched him because he couldn’t control his long limbs. Kim Si-baek moved his foot aside, but Tae-un’s foot followed and tapped him again.
“…”
This was 120 percent intentional.
When he narrowed his eyes and looked, Tae-un pointed at the TV with a bright, innocent face.
“Wow, Si-baek hyung. Our guild is on TV.”
“Looking at the lineup of guilds participating in the conquest, it’s quite impressive. First, there’s the 7777 Guild of Daejeon, which is counted among the large guilds, the Tobazishu Husarsky Guild, and the Gaon Guild. And from Busan, the Avengers Guild…”
“It hasn’t been announced yet, but the guilds participating in the Gaeseong Field conquest will proceed to the kun raid as they are. The Gaeseong Field is a kind of rehearsal. Ten large guilds have agreed to split the five magical beasts amicably.”
“…I see.”
Contrary to his cheerful, chattering voice that sounded as if nothing was wrong, his foot was moving toward a clear purpose under the table. After stealthily rubbing and touching his ankle, it began to slide up, pushing up the hem of his trousers. In the presence of a minor.
To ensure the minor didn’t notice anything strange, Kim Si-baek tried to look away from the sensation creeping up his leg. He quietly cleared his throat to give a hint and tried to push the leg away, but Tae-un did not yield. Instead, he pulled his chair closer and began to fondle his calf.
At this rate, it was only a matter of time before he reached the thigh. Kim Si-baek desperately thought of a way to resolve the situation.
The most effective method would be to give Tae-un’s leg a hard kick, but he immediately rejected that.
‘What if the kid gets hurt?’
If Kim Si-baek hit him, Tae-un was the type to take every blow without dodging. It would be a disaster if he applied too much force and left a bruise on Tae-un’s fair and pretty legs. The boy had sensitive skin, so bruises lasted a long time.
In that case, he had no choice but to select another method.
Although Tae-un acted like a limp civilian who couldn’t fight at all in front of Kim Si-baek, his reflexes were exceptionally superb. He would avoid any incident that occurred suddenly, as long as he wasn’t the one being hit directly.
Trusting those reflexes, Kim Si-baek gave a hard kick under the table. Not at Tae-un’s leg, but at the chair he was sitting on.
“…!”
Sure enough, the moment the chair leg broke and collapsed, Tae-un sprang up from his seat. Far from tumbling over with the chair, his reaction was swift, as if he had anticipated it. Naturally, he wasn’t hurt in the slightest.
“What’s wrong, Un-ah?”
Tae-un, who looked back and forth between the broken chair and under the table as if unable to grasp the situation for a moment, looked blank at Kim Si-baek’s words. It seemed he only realized what had happened belatedly.
Kim Si-baek felt proud of his solution. Unless he intended to break all the chair legs, the boy would probably eat his meal quietly from now on…
“Aren’t you going to eat more tteokbokki?”
“…Oh, I should.”
“Since the chair broke, I’ll bring the stool you made at the one-day class last time.”
“No, no. I don’t need a stool.”
Tae-un, still wearing a bewildered expression, shook his head vigorously, then walked around the table and naturally sat on Kim Si-baek’s lap. As if that were his rightful place.
“…”
[Death and Beauty comments that while they do not know what happened, that man seems to be one step ahead of my apostle.]
Doing his best to pretend he hadn’t read the divine utterance, Kim Si-baek fed tteokbokki to the giant chick sitting primly on his lap with its mouth open.
The process of crossing the psychological line drawn in the heart is difficult until the first step is taken, but from the second step onward, it is not so hard. This was why Tae-un could release his desires to his heart’s content without having to tie Kim Si-baek’s wrists or blindfold his eyes.
“Hng, ah… hhh…”
Kim Si-baek gasped for breath, his fingertips curling. It was hard to suppress the urge to entwine his fingers in the hair of Tae-un, who was bowing his head between his legs, and pull.
Tae-un, who had the genitals deep in his mouth, narrowed his eyes as if he knew the reason for the hand scratching his shoulder. Lifting his face for a moment, Tae-un whispered, kissing the tip of the saliva-drenched genitals with a ‘chu’ sound. The vibration from the voice gave a gentle stimulation to the sensitive area, making his waist twitch.
“I’ll swallow it all the way to my throat, so you can hold my head and thrust your hips however you want.”
“Huu, where on earth did you learn to say things like that, ngh…”
Without waiting for an answer, Tae-un greedily took the genitals back into his mouth. The sensation of the glans rubbing against the soft, tender flesh inside the mouth was something he found difficult to get used to.
It wasn’t that he had no experience or lacked past connections. Kim Si-baek, who had considered himself to be sexually modest, was bewildered by himself every time his activities with Tae-un deepened. If someone had told him a few months ago that he would enter a relationship of overlapping bodies with Tae-un, he would have treated them like a madman.
While rubbing the shaft with his tongue, Tae-un caressed his thigh.